


Crimson Snow

by MysAlexa



Series: Crimson Snow [1]
Category: Tokyo Ghoul, 방탄소년단 | Bangtan Boys | BTS
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Not K-Pop Idols, Alternate Universe - Tokyo Ghoul, Blood and Violence, Canon-Typical Violence, Editing As I Go Because I Haven't Exactly Had This All Planned Out, Gen, Ghoul!BTS, Ghouls, I Tried, I don't know how to write fight scenes, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Tokyo Ghoul AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-26
Updated: 2019-03-24
Packaged: 2019-06-16 18:40:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 31,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15443370
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MysAlexa/pseuds/MysAlexa
Summary: Seven boys struggle to survive in the metropolitan city of Tokyo, where ghouls like them are less than welcome and humans are starting to fight back.





	1. If I Ruled The World

**Author's Note:**

> An alternate universe where our boys are ghouls, having moved to Tokyo some time ago when Korea was no longer a desirable place for ghouls to live in, hoping they can find better lives for themselves.
> 
> Warning: VERY dark and violent themes (as per usual in the Tokyo Ghoul universe) with graphic descriptions of violence and gore and everything in between, with mentions of eating disorders and cannibalization. If you are uncomfortable with any of these, then turn back now; you have been warned. Then again, this is based on Tokyo Ghoul, so you should not be surprised at this point.

Tokyo at night was somewhere you don’t want to be.

City centers were fine; there were a lot of patrons that wandered about the crowded streets enough that there wasn’t a single moment when you would be caught alone and vulnerable. But the outskirts were places you had to look out for, and if you found yourself wandering around the quiet neighborhoods after dark without another human being in sight or within the direct vicinity, then all you could do was to pray that you would survive through the night and live to see another morning.

Then again, the ones who dared to do so in these parts of town—working-class neighbors, small office buildings, a couple of bars a few blocks down that a lot of late-night workers and young citizens alike frequented quite often—were usually ones who weren’t in their right mind, either under the influence after appearing through the wooden-and-paper doors of the aforementioned bars, or just overwhelmed with their own thoughts that they couldn’t even care less where they would stumble off to, much less where they woke up the next morning.

This was decent enough of a reason, as decided, for Kim Namjoon to remain where he’d been sitting for the past two hours, waiting for such an unfortunate individual to meander past his preferred spot: a shadowed alleyway with enough of a distance away from the illuminated building filled with intoxicated patrons, a perfect place that could provide him with enough cover as he took yet another person’s life for yet another night.

He hated himself for having to do this. Enough that the guilt would build up inside him again, making him feel nauseous at himself before he had to swallow it back down again and remind himself that it was a necessary evil, if he wanted to live to see another month. He hated himself for being born as a killer, born as a monster who had to take other people’s lives for the sake of his own.

He hated himself for being born as a ghoul.

Namjoon stared down at the brick-red shingles beneath his feet, shaking his head at how stupid the situation turned out to be, at how stupid  _he_ was for putting himself in this kind of predicament. He wasn’t even sure why the guilt was there in the first place. He owed nothing to humanity; in fact, it was rather the opposite. The discrimination against ghouls, forcing others like him into hiding, either living as hermits in the shadows or blending in with a society that rejected them. Despite their superiority against humans, the Commission of Counter Ghoul told them otherwise, threatening their very existence should any of them dared to expose themselves to the public. He should resent humans if anything, and yet despite it all, he found himself pitying them in the end, even though this mindset of his contributed to his ever-growing conscience and ever-worsening living conditions.

He was lucky enough that he’d stayed under their radar for some time now—since he moved to Tokyo, actually—so for the most part, they did nothing but leave him alone, if they even knew of his existence here in the first place.

Still, said conscience was forcing him into a worse predicament. He had limited himself to the bare minimum for his own survival—one human per month, much less than some of the other ghouls he knew of. What irked him the most was the fact that the one time he did go out to hunt every few weeks, there was a decent chance that he might need to fight over his prey with some other lesser ghoul. Hunting spots were dwindling down with the increase in CCG activity, which meant turf wars would be encountered a lot more often. Humans, the very prey they hunted for, had cornered them to a spot where they had to fight each other for food, like homeless beggars fighting for whatever scraps they could find.

And if there were no scraps to fight for, then the fight would be for their very own lives, and having been in this sort of lifestyle for quite some time now, Namjoon was no stranger to having to resort to tearing through the flesh of one of his own kind.

How naïve he was to think that life here, in Tokyo, would be any better than life back home in Seoul.

So here he was now, hoping he could at least catch one prey—another drunkard, or maybe a low-life good-for-nothing that would ease his conscience a little better—or maybe two if the odds were in his favor. Otherwise, he’d have to come back for yet another night, or starve himself for another week, or worse, resort back to the unwanted.

A quick glance at his watch notified him of how late into the night he was, and how little time he had left before sunrise approached, before he had to throw in the towel and endure his hunger for another full day. It was difficult, perhaps near impossible to hunt in the day, when people are out and about and much more vigilant than they would be in the middle of the night, even more so with ghoul investigators—or ‘doves,’ as the folks around here called them—prowling in the streets, ready to put monsters like him down in an instant. So if he failed tonight, he would have to wait another twenty hours before he could hunt again.

And then, a miracle happened.

The faintest of footsteps caught the ghoul’s attention, alerting him to the presence of another living being within the vicinity. It came from a few houses down, just over the next block, with the neighborhood silent enough at this hour that he could even pick up the faint noise. With renewed vigor, Namjoon immediately stood up, pulled down his mask—an old one, made of plain white canvas like the ones you could buy in art supplies stores, with a crack running through the left eyehole—back over his face, before launching himself to the next roof over, keeping his own footsteps light and as inaudible as possible as he approached the source of the noise.

And as the footsteps grew louder, he did not miss how erratic the pacing was, stopping every now and then as though his target had difficulty in just walking, or perhaps stumbling over their own feet. The growing suspicion in the back of his mind strengthened as soon as he picked up the familiar pungent smell of alcohol permeating the air around his target, lighting his nostrils on fire and instigating an involuntary flinch from the ghoul.

_Another drunkard. Good._

The moment he landed on the final roof just above where his potential prey should be, he peered over the ledge and took a solid minute to observe the poor soul whose life he had to end tonight. It was a male—thank god, he could never imagine himself harming females, even and especially for food—about to be in their late twenties or early thirties at most. The man’s appearance was far from making him a desirable individual of society; disheveled hoodie falling off one shoulder, stained white tank top, torn jeans a couple of sizes too big for the poor man. He hadn’t shaved in a while either, sporting a disgusting goatee that dripped with drool leaking from the corner of his hiccupping mouth.

The ghoul almost sighed in relief. Just the perfect target, and he doubted that anyone would be sad to see this one gone.

Almost brimming with confidence from what he believed to be a successful hunt, he stepped off the edge of the roof in a leisured manner, dropping just a few feet behind the half-conscious man, his movements as graceful and silent as a mouse that the latter didn’t even notice his presence yet. Namjoon smiled to himself, standing up and shortening the distance between them within a split second, before reaching a hand out to cut his prey off from an early escape, the muscles below his shoulder blade twitching and itching to secure the seemingly easy kill.

And it would’ve been an easy kill, had he paid enough attention to his surroundings to notice someone standing right behind them, until his eyes caught a bright flash of red zooming past the side of his face right before pain shot through his entire right hand, causing him to cry out in pain as he reeled back the limb, his fingers coiling in pain as his sight now fell to the shard of crystal about as long as the length of his hand, pulsing with a bright crimson red, jabbed through the back of his hand and sticking out of his palm on the other side.

A silent wince tore through his features as his free hand now clutched the wrist of his injured one, paying no attention to the man in front of him who was now alerted to his presence until a loud piercing yell cut through the silence of the night like a hot knife through butter, and only then did Namjoon look up to notice the terror etched into the drooling’s man face, the human’s wide, blown-out eyes staring not at Namjoon himself but at something  _behind_ them both.

He whipped his head around just in time to see two flickering embers bursting into brilliant crimson flames, illuminating the alleyway and causing the darkness around them to dissipate into nothingness, putting attention towards the figure that now appeared in their direct line of vision. He had a lean stature, and was a few inches shorter than Namjoon himself, but that did not mean that the other ghoul did not look menacing nonetheless. Though dressed in complete black, including a white mask covering the figure’s face, Namjoon could see the pale skin through the eye holes of the sleek mask, eyelids that snapped open to reveal two black orbs tinted with red irises and veins—the mark of a ghoul.

Of course, as if the flickering flames sprouting from the back of the newcomer’s figure wasn’t an obvious indication of the newcomer’s true nature, not to mention there were few things that Namjoon could think of that could pierce a ghoul’s flesh.

Hissing through gritted teeth, Namjoon used his free hand to grab the shard still sticking out through the palm of his hand and yanked it out, discarding it to the side before returning his gaze back at the new challenger, just in time to catch the sight of the flickering flames solidifying in a split second, allowing him just the smallest window of time to sidestep out of the way of the incoming onslaught of crystal shards.

This new ghoul, whoever they were, did not have a good aim, for most of the shards laid out a carpet of crystals across the concrete floor before catching up to the human, who was terrified enough out of his mind that his consciousness snapped back and prompted the man to start sprinting towards the light of a street lamp just at the mouth of the alleyway. One of them managed to stab the man at his ankle and a loud pained cry came from the man in the midst of his drunken stupor before he used his drunkenness to his advantage and managed to scramble back to his feet, enough to put him out of harm’s way as he turned around the corner and disappeared from view.

And all Namjoon could do was watch as his target slipped away from his grasp and curse under his breath.

The other ghoul did, too.

“Fuck,” came a deep, almost raspy but quiet voice from the figure dressed in black at the other end of the alley. Then, all in the same breath, the red-tinted eyes whipped over to where Namjoon was, and the newcomer sighed, “No matter. I suppose another ghoul will have to do."

Namjoon barely had enough time to process what the other ghoul had just spoken before another barrage of crystal shards flew through the air, this time in his direction, sparing the former just enough time to dodge and roll out of the way, allowing the shards to stab themselves into the wall behind him. Recovering with ease, he glared back at the other ghoul, watching as the red orbs narrowed in annoyance before the crystallized appendage made another wave, shooting more sharpened bullets across the narrow space Namjoon was given to work with. It was then when he felt two jabs of pain shoot through his leg, causing him to stumble a bit in his next dodge, and when he recovered he immediately went to yank out the two flickering shards stabbed into his ankle, just in time before he was being showered with another wave of crystals.

This time, Namjoon pushed himself off the ground, leaping over his opponent’s head, and it was as if time itself had slowed down around him; a burst of flame ignited in both of his eyes as he felt the muscles below his shoulder blade twitching and shifting, before his own cells burst through the skin of his back, binding together and forming a familiar silver appendage that wrapped itself around his arm, covering his limb and forming a sharp pointed blade at the end where his fist was. It all happened in a fraction of a second, and just as he felt his feet touch the ground once more, he immediately launched himself straight at his opponent, catching the latter by surprise when he drove the silver blade straight through the left wing the second it began to dissolve.

It was almost like everything stood still right at that moment, the sharp blade piercing through the other ghoul’s organ—his  _kagune_ —until his blade caught itself stuck in the middle, stopping the ghoul’s own forward momentum. It took him a split second to realize his mistake when a loud splitting cry erupted from the body right next to him, then the next thing he knew, Namjoon felt himself hurled away from the splintered ground in front of him, dislodging the blade from the pierced wing, and instead backward from where he came, thrown against the wall behind them both, feeling his back slamming against the brick wall before he fell face-first onto the concrete floor underneath.

Despite ghouls’ more durable physiology, the lack of flesh in his digestive systems proved to be his undoing this time as he felt his nose crack, along with perhaps a rib or two from the sheer impact after being thrown against the wall by another ghoul’s  _kagune_ , the organ itself possessing the strength sevenfold of a typical human’s. It hurt a lot, and Namjoon was staggering as he pulled himself back up to his feet, tilting his head up to see his opponent doubling over in pain, the left flaming wing now reduced to half the size it was before.

The ghoul in black hissed in pain before he whipped his head up, growling at Namjoon.

“You little prick,” he snarled, and Namjoon almost lamented on how the former was a lot smaller than him still, when he noticed the still-intact right wing twitching before throwing another shower of crystals towards him, his eyes snapping shut the moment it happened.

He felt his body surging forward, twitching the slightest bit as well before he felt something else bursting through the skin of his back, before warmth surged through his entire upper form instead of piercing crystals stabbing into his skin, instead feeling little pricks, like nails biting into his skin, on the back of his arms raised in front of him.

When he opened his eyes again, he saw the familiar silver sheen wrapped around both of his arms, wrapped in veins tinted with a deep royal purple, and noticed an uncomfortable feeling now present in his lower jaw, like a mouth guard clamped around his jaw and chin and all the way down to his neck and over his shoulders, as if joined with the initial  _kagune_  he was more accustomed to.

Namjoon blinked, feeling the embers in his eyes flickering as he realized that he’d just unleashed his  _kakuja_.

The sole indicator of the monster he truly had become.

He swore to himself this wouldn’t happen. He’d hoped that, the first time he bit into the flesh of one of his own, he wouldn’t let himself become the monster people told him he would be, if he ever resorted into committing the cruel deed of cannibalization. He’d feared that, from the rumors he’s been told, he might lose himself and never come back from the pit of hell he’d fall into as soon as he swallowed.

He was relieved to find himself recovered from that ordeal the first time, leaving unscathed, his  _kagune_  still as it used to be, as he grew up with.

But now, he saw that not just one, but  _both_ of his arms wrapped in silver, and a pulsing in the back of his head that he wished was an indication of his growing hunger pains.

He was still in the midst of processing what’d just happened when all of a sudden, he felt his body surging forwards once more, this time much more against his own will as he felt his right arm pull back before lunging towards the hunched figure of the other ghoul before him. The latter’s eyes went wide for a split second as he realized that the situation had shifted, but was still nimble enough, had just enough energy to jump out of the way before stumbling to his left just as Namjoon felt his left arm moving to strike as well.

Overexerting his now-injured  _kagune_ , however, became his opponent’s undoing as the winged ghoul was no longer fast enough to dodge the right arm coming back around and driving the sharpened end straight through his abdomen, drawing out another pained cry from the ghoul that echoed through the alleyway. A pang of guilt shot through Namjoon as he felt his arm driving the other ghoul straight towards the wall behind the latter, pinning him there with the blade through his abdomen, and another cry split the air, before everything stood still.

Namjoon could see through the eye holes of his mask, blood beginning to drip beneath the white mask that still covered his opponent’s face—a mask that, upon closer inspection, he realized resembled the face of a cat’s, with small triangular protrusions on the top edges, along with red painted features. He could hear raspy, uneven breathing emanating from behind the mask, too, and he could imagine that this weakened ghoul was no different than himself, perhaps starving just like he was. Looking down, he saw where his arm was wedged deep into the abdominal muscles, blood beginning to seep from the wound and staining the dark clothing with a dark shade of red no different than the color of the  _ukaku kagune_.

And yet despite being well aware of the pain he was now inflicting to the weakened ghoul, Namjoon could not summon enough willpower—could not, for the sake of himself and the ghoul in front of him—retreat his arm back from the latter, regardless of how much he wanted to.

That was, until the silence was broken once more by the broken laugh of the weakened ghoul before him.

“So, this is how you wish to fight then.”

Though the voice was weak, Namjoon could still make out the malice behind it.

Then the laughter died as soon as it appeared, and the smaller ghoul lifted his head, staring back at Namjoon with cold, emotionless, red-tinted eyes.

“Then so be it.”

Namjoon was caught in the third surprise tonight, watching in partial disbelief as his opponent’s own  _kagune_  began to shift and change; his left wing regenerated in an instant, returning to its previous size and growing larger even before crystallizing once more along with the right wing, forming what appeared to be large insect-like claws protruding from his shoulder blades with jagged, crystallized ends pointing straight at Namjoon. More spikes protruded along the shoulder blade as the crimson spread onto his upper body form almost similar to Namjoon’s own armor, extending up his neckline and across his chest. Two of the longer spikes acted like extra appendages that went along his arms, following the limbs as the transformed ghoul reached down to grab a hold of Namjoon’s own arm, and, with a sense of renewed strength, began to pull the blade out of his abdomen, allowing his feet to fall back down on the hard surface of the concrete floor beneath them.

And then, before Namjoon could react on his own, the other ghoul grunted as his crystallized appendages surged forwards, stabbing into Namjoon’s shoulders and throwing him to the opposite wall, pinning him there like he just did to the other ghoul. He let out a grunt in pain, feeling the  _kagune_  piercing through even the  _kakuja_  armor and into his flesh.

Yet, it seemed as though Namjoon’s  _kagune_  continued to have a mind of its own as his arms grabbed onto the crystal appendages, gripped them with a tight hold before his arms hurled the other ghoul further down the alleyway, but the latter caught himself just on time to flip himself back over, sliding his feet on the ground to use the friction to stop himself. Wasting no time, the ghoul in black immediately launched himself back at Namjoon, opting for close-range attacks instead of his previous long-range sharpened bullets; he aimed his fist at Namjoon’s head, which the latter grabbed with his own hand halfway, but was distracted when one of the insect-like claws lunged at him as well, making him unable to avoid the blow to his stomach. The large left appendage then stabbed itself into Namjoon’s shoulder once more, prompting one of the spikes on Namjoon’s own back which he hadn’t noticed before to sprout into another appendage of its own that lunged towards the other ghoul’s chest.

Keeping the other ghoul with a firm hold, Namjoon then tightened his grip on the clenched fist and threw the ghoul in black with a body slam to the ground behind him. He felt the limb that had stabbed into his chest falling limp, even more so when Namjoon’s arms formed sharpened ends once more to stab themselves into the other ghoul, pinning him to the ground to ensure he wouldn’t escape. The latter let out one sharp final yelp, hissing in pain but made no attempt to escape the hold, and Namjoon watched as the  _kagune_  began to regress back to its initial form then retreat back to the ghoul’s body—a  _kakuja_  was useless, after all, when the user had almost no energy left to fight back with.

It was when the ghoul started coughing and spit something onto the ground—dark red blood, the color of his  _kagune_ —when Namjoon found himself regaining control of his own monstrous limbs; he forced his  _kagune_  to retreat as well, the armor disappearing from his upper form and his jaw releasing the tension that had been held this entire time. He released his hold on the defeated young ghoul in front of him—not that he even needed to keep him pinned down any longer—and when the last of the specialized cells had returned to the organ in his back where they originated from, it felt as though all the energy had been drained out of Namjoon’s body as he felt his entire form going limp, falling down to his knees with his arms reaching out just to catch himself and prevent himself from falling over.

He was exhausted, to say the least, and what was worse was the fact that he still had yet to eat.

But, having regained full control of his mind and all of his limbs, as he looked down on his defeated opponent before him, Namjoon could not bring himself to care any less about the gnawing hunger making itself evident in the pit of his stomach. He had indeed won, and he could just devour the fallen ghoul before him as he had done to others before.

However, after everything that had just happened—experiencing what it was like to be a  _kakuja_  ghoul for the first time—there was no way in hell that he was doing any of that again.

He was not going to eat this ghoul.

He was just going to have to wait for twenty more hours.

He could wait. Just a little bit longer.

Without even thinking twice, Namjoon leaned back to a sitting position, feeling suffocated by everything to the point that he reached up to pull his mask off his face. He took a sharp intake of breath—the air was still pungent with blood and remnants of alcohol, but it was refreshing regardless, and it felt as though he could think with a clear head again for the first time in what seemed like ages.

So that was what he did. He closed his eyes and breathed.

And before he knew it, he was matching his breathing patterns to that of the half-conscious ghoul lying still in front of him, face down on the ground still—just two exhausted ghouls that, when he thought about it, were just trying their damnedest to live another night or two.

The sort of life they had to live…

But of course, there was never enough time for a ghoul to be left alone to rest, much less after causing the amount of commotion mere minutes ago which must’ve surely attracted some attention from the early-risers of the neighborhood, or perhaps even the lucky patron who’d escaped their clutches what seemed like a forever ago.

Namjoon snapped a single eyelid open as soon as his ears picked up another disturbance in the still, silent air around them, and he ceased his ragged breathing as he began to focus in on the noise. Footsteps—but a lot different than the ones he’d heard earlier this night. These ones were much less disheveled—a steady, increasing pace, like someone quickening his speed from a simple walk to a jog to a run. It didn’t sound like sneakers were the cause of those footsteps, either—more like dress shoes, the fancy ones people wore alongside their formal business suits, with a tie and dress pants and everything.

Exactly like the ones that ghoul investigators wore.

And there weren’t just one of them, but  _three_.

“The report came from right around this area. C’mon—let’s hurry or we’ll might miss ‘em!”

Both of Namjoon’s eyelids flew open, revealing the normal dark brown shade of his eyes’ more human-like irises. He was tired still, but he was awake—alert, more than he had been all throughout the night, all due to the spike of terror that shot through him at the mere thought of the approaching doves—the bane of ghouls’ existence.

Like a bucket of water had just been thrown straight to his face, Namjoon gathered enough of whatever strength he had left to stand up, staggering at first as he struggled to regain his balance, his hand flying right to steady himself with the brick wall beside him, but recovered soon enough to stand upright and replace his mask upon his facial features; the footsteps were getting louder now, about a few houses away from getting caught red-handed, which meant that if he were to confirm his survival for another night, he had to leave— _now_.

After a fight like that, there was no way he could take on three doves all at once, even if he had an enemy-turned-ally with a common goal as him to fight alongside him.

And that exact thought brought him to an abrupt halt just as he was about to leap onto the roof above, and instead turn his attention back to the unmoving object lying on the ground a couple of meters away from him, and a grim thought slipped into his mind alongside the last.

The other ghoul made no attempts to move still— _ukaku_  users were known to have low stamina, that much Namjoon was aware of—but it seemed that even the former had yet to pick up the signs of distress coming about less than fifteen seconds away. Blood was still seeping from the stab wounds Namjoon had involuntarily inflicted upon him earlier, and even more pooling beneath the stomach area. A quick glance around and Namjoon took notice of the dull blackish-red crystals, no longer pulsing with life, laid like a death trap of a carpet across the ground not too far from them. It would provide them with perhaps three seconds at most—he doubted that what would be a hindrance to normal civilians would prove to be much of an obstacle to trained government agents.

But perhaps, that might just be enough time for Namjoon to do what his damn conscience was practically screaming in the back of his head to do right now, and escape this place just in time to see the coming sunrise.

About one step away from turning around the corner and catching a glimpse of the two ghouls, the smaller one of the two finally showed signs of life only when Namjoon had the former’s bleeding arm over his shoulder, one hand securing that arm in place to prevent the former from slipping out of his grasp and another underneath his armpit, propping the smaller figure up to as much of a standing position as manageable.

It was a sharp inhale at first, as weak as it might be and as painful as it might feel when the action was soon followed with an unintentional wince, like taking a much needed breath of fresh air since the moment he yielded. The soft noise prompted Namjoon to look down upon his former opponent, watching through the eye holes of the white mask as the pale, blood-stained skin of the latter’s eyelids peeled open to reveal a pair of dark brown, almost pitch-black eyes that held an expression much similar to Namjoon’s own eyes—a painful mix of confusion and delusion.

Then the two formidable combatants locked gazes, and the nameless ghoul’s eyes steeled with a mask of questioning.

“Wha—” The raspy, near-inaudible voice betrayed his attempt at a cold front, and a particularly painful cough followed soon after, spitting blood on the ground. The voice sounded so weak, and for the first time, Namjoon was hearing it speak with no ill intentions behind the words it spoke. “What are you doing?”

“Getting you out of here,” Namjoon spoke curtly, short and simple, before he heard the doves finally turning around the corner and halting to an abrupt stop at the sight before them. He spared them just one single quick glance—eyed their coats and business suits, then at their silver briefcases that, with a twitch of a thumb, began to change forms all on their own—before he gathered enough strength to push himself off the ground, putting in just a little more effort than usual to support the extra weight he was now carrying over his shoulder, landing with certainty onto the rooftop above.

Something slammed straight onto the cluster of shingles his feet had just been in just as Namjoon leaped out of the way and onto the roof of the adjacent house, not even sparing a glimpse at what insane weapon of mass destruction these doves had in hand this time around—what other peculiar organ had been ripped out of another one of his kind and made into said weapon.

His conscience didn’t let him.

But that was when he began to question his conscience again, as the true gravity of the situation finally washed over him like a tidal wave and he found himself sneaking glances at the broken ghoul whose life he just spared and saved.

He could’ve eaten him. He could’ve just left him there to fend for himself. It would be one less ghoul to worry about, one less ghoul to claim territory from. It wasn’t like Namjoon hadn’t done it before, and yet, he just couldn’t do it.

Maybe it was a subconscious sign of respect he was offering to his former opponent. A fair acknowledgment towards the good fight they just endured through, as pointless as it might seem now. And in the back of his mind, Namjoon hoped that this foolish act he was committing might indeed lead to one less ghoul he would need to be worried about, though in a different, perhaps more amicable sense.

Once he’d put a good distance between the two ghouls and the doves—with a few good boosts propelling them forward under the aid of his  _kagune_ , the much more familiar one he’d been accustomed with—Namjoon settled on yet another darkened corner of a different neighborhood than the one they were just in to catch his breath, and perhaps make a quick check to see the extent of the nameless ghoul’s wounds that he himself had inflicted.

Feeling his feet touch solid ground once more, Namjoon leaned over to lay the other ghoul down and propped up against the wall, heavy, painful grunts escaping the ghoul’s chapped lips from even the slightest movements.

He really did a number on this guy, Namjoon thought to himself.

“아, 씨발...”

“Language,” Namjoon mused to the other man with a soft smile, not even thinking twice of what he’d just said out loud, not even realizing what the other man nor himself just uttered within the span of less than two seconds, the words slipping out of their lips so smoothly that it took Namjoon an extra heartbeat to realize what just happened.

To realize that he had just responded to the man before him in his mother tongue—a language he'd almost never used outside, here in Tokyo, for such a long time.

And it seemed that the other ghoul just made the same realization, too, when his eyes behind the mask went wide in a mixture of surprise, delight and disbelief.

“You speak Korean?” the soft voice asked, almost incredulous, once more speaking in the language foreign to anyone who might be listening in to their conversation at the moment, but all too familiar for the two injured ghouls.

“Born in Ilsan, have been traveling all around the country with my family since,” Namjoon replied, a sense of nostalgia filling his chest and a small smile began to make its way up his face. “Moved here about two years ago.”

“Let me guess: you were one of those idiots who thought they could make a better living in the city that’s practically the worldwide hub for ghouls all around the world.”

A bit taken aback at the other ghoul’s choice of words, Namjoon responded with a quick nod. “That is, until I found out about the CCG.”

“Until you found out about the CCG,” the other ghoul repeated, chuckling to himself until the laughter dissolved into another coughing fit. “Don’t worry; you’re not the only one of those idiots who ran around these parts. Exhibit B right here.”

Namjoon couldn’t resist giving out a small laugh of his own, but it was soon followed with a sigh of relief at the thought of the current predicament he’d found himself in now. It was relieving, to say the least, to be speaking in his native language once more. It brought a sense of familiarity back to him—a sense of home even, dare he say—and there was no doubt that the fact that the two shared the same mother tongue had set any previous animosity aside, making them realize that the two of them were, indeed, more similar to each other than they had previously thought.

A quick but thorough once-over the abdominal wound, however, replaced Namjoon’s smile with a concerned frown as he realized the open flesh wound had yet to start to heal.

“You’re in no good shape,” he murmured, voicing out his concerns almost absent-mindedly. “You will need some time to rest yourself before you can go out and about again."

“All thanks to you, huh?”

Namjoon’s lips tightened to form a firm straight line. “Sorry for almost killing you. For what it's worth, you'll make it through the night. You wouldn’t be if I’d left you there.”

“Yeah, well, sorry for trying to kill you in the first place, so I guess I deserve this.” The ghoul then looked down upon his wound, grimacing at the sight. “Wow, it does  _not_ look good. Not too much of a surprise, either."

“You haven’t been eating well either, huh?”

The other ghoul scoffed. “In this economy? For what other possible reason could there be for being so willing to bite off your head? Wouldn’t have, if I’d known you’d beat me into a pulp, though.”

“Well, that means it’ll take you a lot longer to heal then.” Namjoon stood up then, dusting himself off as he took his mask off once again, showing to his once-opponent his true face. “I’m taking you back to my brother’s place, then. He might still have some scraps to spare. A good place for you to rest and recuperate, too.”

“ _What?_ ” The unnamed ghoul was about to exclaim in protest, began to rise up from where he was sitting down until what Namjoon could imagine was a grim reminder of the true extent of his injuries forcing him back down again with a hard wince and a sharp hiss.

“It’s the least I can do.” It really wasn’t, Namjoon told himself, because again, he owed this ghoul nothing—in fact, it was rather the complete opposite, for he had done more than enough to pay back what this ghoul had done to him first.

Regardless, Namjoon made no attempts to retract his words, keeping them cemented between the two of them, allowing them to sink in and settle within the silence that engulfed them both now. The other ghoul made no further protests, either; no further comments, eyes just observing Namjoon’s all-too-human features that were hiding behind the broken mask, watching as the latter extended a single hand out for the former to shake.

“Kim Namjoon,” the taller ghoul spoke with a clear voice, at first hesitant and worried that his friendliness would be retaliated with a more hostile response.

The frown was soon replaced, however, with a warm, dimpled smile when the smaller ghoul took his hand in the latter's own pale one, before he moved to take off his own white, cat-shaped mask, revealing a face that felt much more familiar than any of those he’s ever seen since he first moved to this strange, foreign land.

“Min Yoongi. Pleasure to meet you.”

“The pleasure’s all mine.”

Amicable words exchanged, Namjoon lifted the other ghoul—Yoongi—back up as before, now with a clearer destination in mind, and a light feeling in his chest at the thought of his newfound ally.

“Fuck. Looks like I don’t really have much of a choice, huh?” Yoongi muttered almost to himself, adding a light scoff. “I guess beggars can’t be choosers.”

They can’t, Namjoon thought to himself.

But they can be friends.


	2. Triptych

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my god, I'm shit at writing fight scenes.
> 
> And my deepest apologies for such a long chapter; I feel like a lot of explaining to do and some backgrounds and settings to be established, and I didn't realize this chapter filled thirteen whole pages (thirteen pages!) and now I think the ending fell a bit too short and now the first chapter seems pathetic compared to this one, but please bear with me, this is the first time I've written a BTS fanfic and a Tokyo Ghoul AU at that, and I had to go back and reread some of the manga and rewatch some of the anime just to get the descriptions right, but kinda makes me miss the good old days of dedicating hours to these kinds of things.
> 
> Also something worth mentioning, I'll be introducing the members one or two at a time each chapter, and in case you're wondering, I assigned RC types according to... several factors. I'm also putting hidden or maybe not-so-hidden references here and there, as well as tying some things to the main Tokyo Ghoul series (like this chapter), so look out for those (or not)!
> 
> I might be having a little too much fun with this, but let's just see how long this'll last.

Dealing with fellow ghouls was difficult.

The Commission of Counter Ghoul classified ghouls according to a specified rating system, which ghouls ended up using for their own personalized measure of strength. For Namjoon, C or B-rated ghouls were just bothersome distractions. He had gained himself quite the reputation over the rather short period of time he’s been here—‘Monster’ was an alias he worked under in the past, which might’ve been ironic to his mask and overall appearance but well-earned after he started doing other things he began to regret. That name struck fear to some of the lesser ghouls and rookie investigators within the first few months he’s been in Tokyo. Hence, any lesser ghouls who dared stand up against him were either suicidal daredevils or desperate, starving souls who couldn’t care less about being ripped apart from inside out.

A-rated ghouls would put up more of a fight—not the best ones but just decent, like a little exercise training for him to stretch his muscles for a bit so they wouldn’t turn stiff after being so passive and inactive for so long.

S-rated ghouls, however—individuals such as Namjoon himself—were a different story. Now _that_ would be a real challenge.

As it turns out, Yoongi was an S-rated ghoul as well, which came as no surprise considering how both were quite worn out after their little skirmish. In fact, he’d heard about the ghoul who turned out to be just a year older than him; ‘Suga’ was the alias Yoongi had been using at the time, which might’ve been a nod to his mask but not to his overall demeanor, since the older ghoul was anything but ‘sweet’, per se—in fact, he was more towards either the bitter or salty side, in Namjoon’s own humble opinion. He had established his own feeding ground after taking them over from a couple of small, insignificant groups, an impressive feat all on its own—that much was what Namjoon was aware of. He supposed he found himself fortunate to have befriended a fellow powerful ghoul, through their common origins and motivations for moving to Tokyo in the first place.

That, along with other things the two found in common with each other, which included their shared passion over hip-hop music and a dream to join the music industry someday, if they didn’t have to hide from humans and doves on a daily basis.

Namjoon looked up from his book for a brief glance around the room; the aforementioned ghoul was currently asleep—a common occurrence, it seemed, since he could take naps three to five times a day, and Namjoon swore he’s never seen an individual as lethargic as him—with his head placed not on the pillow but on his arm, covered by the long black sleeve of the thin cotton sweater he’s wearing, curled up on top of his own stained mattress in the corner of the room, with soft snores emanating from his slightly-ajar mouth.

Since Namjoon took him here a couple months ago, Yoongi had become a permanent fixture in the old, run-down building that served as their current base and safe house, though the arrangement did not become permanent until about three weeks ago; Namjoon remembered waking up to hear the sound of scrambling footsteps rushing down the stairs to the first floor, and with a sigh he followed the footsteps downstairs, just to stop at the bottom of the steps when he caught the sight of Yoongi pausing in front of the front door, fixing the same black leather jacket he was wearing during their first encounter and his white mask over his face—a mask that, upon closer inspection, had resembled the head those Japanese bobtail figurines, the _maneki neko_ , with details in a mix of black and red—and Namjoon’s younger brother, Taehyung, staring at the black-clad ghoul with wide, almost pleading eyes.

“You’re leaving already, _hyung_?” Taehyung was saying, the disappointment clear in his voice. It was the first time in a long time that Taehyung had addressed someone else other than Namjoon with the honorific, and Taehyung had been ecstatic to see that his brother had brought a new friend over to their place the first time they got here. To him, any company was much appreciated.

“I’ve overstayed my welcome,” Yoongi had replied with an emotionless voice, unable to meet the eyes of the younger ghoul. It was obvious that within the two weeks he’s been living under this roof, Yoongi had grown a soft spot, however slight, for the youngest ghoul in the household. “I’ve rested and healed. I appreciated the hospitalities, but I have somewhere else to be.”

“And where would that be?” Namjoon queried then, which brought Yoongi’s attention to him as the latter took a sharp intake of breath, knowing the former had put him in a corner, whether intentional or not.

“Somewhere that’s not _here_. Don’t take this the wrong way—we part as allies, Namjoon, or perhaps _friends_ even, but I must not stay.”

“And return to what?” When Namjoon’s second question received no answer, he continued, “A life of roaming around the streets with no place to come home to. Sure, it might be all right, but I am well aware of your dietary habits now—I’ve seen your _kakuja_ , _hyung_. How much longer can you last without easy prey to find?”

“Not long,” Yoongi had admitted then, “which gives me even more of a reason to leave before I start going insane and decide to take a bite out of either of you in your sleep.”

Namjoon shook his head. “You won’t have to, if you stay. Two ghouls are better than one—we make ourselves an agreement and we’ll cover more hunting ground that way. If one of us ever get into trouble, the other would have his back. Makes things much more efficient, I’d say.”

And with someone as lethargic as Yoongi, Namjoon figured that efficiency had become the former’s specialty.

Yoongi gave him an indescribable look then, only for Taehyung to jump up and turn his head around to glare at his older brother. “Just _two_? But what about—”

“I’m not letting you go out there, Tae,” Namjoon cut him off before the younger one could protest any further, but his tone of voice showed his obvious regret. “It’s too dangerous. For all they know, you died that night and I ran away. They’ll be looking for me, but what happens if one of them ever sees you and reports back to their base?”

Namjoon hated for having to limit his brother’s movements—Taehyung had about as much energy as a little puppy that demanded to be taken out for walks every single morning, but it wasn’t something that could be done, and Namjoon was doing all this for his brother’s sake more than his own. If any of their enemies found them, Namjoon would be able to fight them off, or at least give a head start for Taehyung to escape.

Taehyung fighting other ghouls, on the other hand? Namjoon did not want to find out.

It appeared that their sidetracked conversation had piqued Yoongi’s interest once more, the ghoul eyeing the two brothers with furrowed eyebrows as he struggled to figure out what it was the Kim brothers were talking about, but did not question it because what he said next solidified his own stubborn decision to leave their safe house.

“I’ve tried to kill you _once_ , Namjoon,” Yoongi hissed at the younger ghoul, reminding the latter once more that despite his smaller stature—even smaller than Taehyung—the figure and mask was all just a façade that a powerful and ruthless ghoul was hiding behind. “I tried to _eat_ you. What’ll stop me from doing that a second time, hm?”

“It won’t happen—we won’t let it happen.” Namjoon was aware of the promises he was making, knowing full well of the consequences should things start to fail. He’d hate having to fight his newfound friend a second time, but would have to if Yoongi ever attempted to hurt his brother. “And besides, do you really want to go back out there—back to living as a mere hermit? There’s a ghoul that’s been roaming around these parts, eating more than their supposed fill. I’ve heard people saying that it’s an S-rated ghoul, like us. They’ve been claiming other ghouls’ hunting grounds—it’s just a matter of time before they take yours. Not to mention the fact that individuals like them always bring trouble for us—the CCG kind of trouble. It wouldn’t be wise for you to be out there all alone—whereas in here, you have us.”

Yoongi scowled then, and their arguments did not stop there; it took a few more minutes of persuasion from the brothers’ side, with Namjoon making more valid points and Taehyung… well, Taehyung being his usual stubborn self, staring up at Yoongi with wide puppy-dog eyes and a pout. Having had enough, and knowing that it would be impossible to counter-argue against the two brothers, Yoongi eventually relented, though under the pretense of the argument itself being too long and winding and overall exhausting that he excused himself to zombie-walk back upstairs, take his mask and jacket back off and curled back into a ball atop his mattress, falling into a nap almost instantaneously, as though nothing had happened at all, and everything had gone back to normal, with Taehyung grinning from cheek to cheek in delight upon knowing he’s earned himself a second other brother figure in the makeshift household.

The youngest ghoul was currently sitting cross-legged on top of his own mattress between them, wearing a mustard-yellow sweater that was two sizes too big for him until the sleeves were extending past his fingertips, eyes enraptured at the television set right across from him and paying little attention to the sleeping ghoul since he’d cranked the volume up to its maximum, waiting for the news programme to end and for his favorite anime to begin, rocking back and forth to contain his excitement.

Taehyung had this child-like innocence that, while adorable, made Namjoon feel more compelled to protect his brother from the evils of the world, even more so considering what they’ve both been through. The two siblings lost their parents a long time ago, back when Taehyung was still a lot younger—too young to understand where their parents had disappeared off to nor the reason why they never returned that one night—which put them in a rough spot that worsened over time, hence prompting them to move to Tokyo in hopes of finding better lives for themselves, just like Yoongi had described once before. Letting Taehyung act upon his childish tendencies were the least Namjoon could do to return to him the childhood he never had.

Though it wasn’t like there weren’t situations that forced Taehyung to abandon those tendencies and act more like the mature young adult others expected him to be, but those situations had been harsh—harsher than any other young man his age had to deal with, human or ghoul. The older brother hoped Taehyung would never be forced into those situations ever again, and he would do everything in his power to ensure that.

Namjoon spared just one glance at the flickering television screen and sighed upon reading the headline—it was showing news of recent development of the CCG’s efforts in trying to apprehend the Binge Eater, the S-rated ghoul Namjoon had been hearing about who’s been stirring trouble in recent years, but continued to rise in prominence as time passed. Appearance and gender unknown, the infamous ghoul was reported to have been roaming around Tokyo a lot, but unlike a nomad, had been settling in specific wards for a good amount of time before moving, perhaps out of boredom, or perhaps for other reasons. They had been in the 14th ward around the time Namjoon met Yoongi, which also happened to be the location of their fateful encounter that night, and with their known modus operandi that earned their nickname in the media, the string of murders connected to this particular ghoul was now being pulled over to the 11th ward, which just so happened to be where they are now—the location of the safe house.

The Binge Eater’s presence brought nothing but trouble to the ghouls around them, too; their excessive hunting meant less food to go around amongst the ghouls in the ward,  They were an S-rated ghoul who ate because they wanted to and not because they needed to, unlike ghouls such as Namjoon and Yoongi and Taehyung soon enough—even within the past few months alone, there now to the area they lived in and this recent development no doubt did not sit well with any of the young ghouls at the verge of desperation.

Then there was also the issue about them taking over feeding grounds from numerous lesser ghouls and instilling more fear into any humans who still dared to venture out after daylight hours, which meant less available prey for other ghouls, which all together brought uneasiness to ghouls in whichever ward they settled in next.

Now in the 11th ward, Namjoon imagined that the Binge Eater would bring trouble to him and his comrades soon as well.

Thinking back to this reminded Namjoon of his monthly duties; he turned his attention to the ticking clock with the broken outer casing on the left wall, realizing that it was sunset now—about time for him to once more venture out of their home to search for more food to sustain the three of them for another thirty days.

He then turned back to the sleeping ghoul in the corner of the room. Yoongi had made it clear not too long since he decided to stay in their house, that assisting him in his biweekly hunts was the least he could do in return for the shelter they now provided him with. However, knowing full well how much the elder disliked being disturbed from his frequent naps, and noting how deep he was into his sleep, Namjoon ultimately decided that he’d leave without the other ghoul. He decided that, exasperated scowls about being left behind was a better fate than having to suffer the wrath of the elder ghoul after the latter had to be ripped out of whatever blissful moment sleep offered him—it was a mistake Namjoon made once before, and one he didn’t intend to repeat a second time.

He stood up then, setting his book down beside his mattress, then reaching over to grab his white canvas mask beneath the soot-covered table lamp right next to it, as well as his faded blue scarf. He made sure to bid his brother goodbye—the latter was too occupied with his anime then—before heading down the stairs, putting on his beige coat then his mask, then wrapped the scarf securely around his neck, before opening the door and stepping outside.

He was immediately greeted with the cold winter air the moment he did, feeling warm blood rush up to his cheeks and tinting them with a faint shade of red. Winters in Korea were colder than in Japan, and it was uncommon to see thick layers of snow in Tokyo, but even so, the temperature would never rise above ten degrees. And ghouls, though more resilient and durable than regular humans, were not immune to changes in weather either, hence his coat and scarf, the few things he could afford to shield himself from the cold.

With a sharp intake of breath, he jumped up, using his enhanced strength and agility to launch himself towards the apartment building opposite to the house, his hands catching one of the window sills on the third floor just on time before he’d start to fall. Though he barely even felt his fingers grazing the damn thing, he caught the sight of one of the two flower pots sitting on the side of the stone slab wobbling in the corner of his eye, and when he glanced at it, it slipped over the edge and fell over, out of his reach. Namjoon could do nothing but watch with wide eyes as the small clay pot plummeted towards the ground and smashed into pieces of broken clay and dirt and a limp stalk, a loud resounding _crack_ echoing in the air.

And then came voices from behind the closed curtains of the window he was still holding onto, and the ghoul paled, swallowing his pride.

Wanting to waste no more time, he immediately used his strength on his arms to pull himself up, allowing him to scale the wall of the side of the building until his hands were pulling him up onto the flat roof of the apartment building, a barren clearing save for air conditioning units, electrical boxes, water tanks and a small brick structure with a metal door that led into the building. He jumped over the raised ledge and his feet were walking on top of a solid surface once more, peering over the ledge one final time and grimaced at the sight of the miniscule broken pot pieces scattered across the grass below.

It wasn’t the first time that something like this has happened, and he doubted it would be the last.

Heaving his breath, he walked over to the other side of the roof, his attention now switching over to the breathtaking sight of the sunset in the distance and the rest of the ward stretched out before him, now turning into ghouls’ hunting grounds upon nightfall. The ghouls of the 11th ward were civil though, for the most part—their leader, Hagi, had established rules here long ago that kept them civil, rules that the two brothers and now Yoongi had to follow through as well if they didn’t want to get into trouble or risk getting kicked out of the ward, or worse.

In fact, civil enough that they held meetings each month or so—Namjoon had been the one out of the two brothers to ever attend the meetings, on both his and Taehyung’s behalf, since he didn’t want his brother to be involved in the more serious matters. The meetings were to ensure that everyone had been adhering to the rules of the ward, to give warm introductions to other ghouls who had ended up in Ōta for non-hostile reasons—individuals like Yoongi, when Namjoon brought the older ghoul to one such meeting after it was decided that the former would remain here for the time being—and to deal with any problems stirring up in the ward, including those more aggressive ghouls who came here just to stir up trouble.

And Namjoon could just imagine what topic of interest would be discussed in the next coming meeting. Not to mention, there’s something about that other newcomer—Rize Kamishiro—that put him at unease—her smile was the kind that hid something behind it, the unsettling kind that he’s seen before in less-than-pleasant individuals.

Then again, it could just be because the female ghoul had been borrowing books from Namjoon, whatever few he had obtained over the years, but returned them with folded pages—a typical bookworm’s pet peeve.

Two hours into the evening, it was decided that it was going to be another slow night. He’d been reduced to sitting on someone’s roof again—he was well aware that one of the shingles had cracked underneath his feet when he was sitting down earlier, but told himself no one would notice it anyway—gazing up at the skies above and the waning moon just peeking from behind clouds. He wondered to the situation back at home; Taehyung should be asleep now, if he wasn’t reading mangas in the dim light of the room, which was a bad habit of the young ghoul’s. Yoongi might have woken up at this point, perhaps wandering where Namjoon had gone, but might be too lazy to head outside just to find him. Namjoon might be coming home to his _hyung_ ’s scowls and protests, but nothing that he couldn’t handle.

He also made a mental note to stop at a convenience store on his way home, if his clothes weren’t too messy or even more so if he had a fruitless night, to buy some more heat packs to be shared amongst the three ghouls, as he hid his hands inside the sleeves of his coat and his mouth behind the warmth of his scarf when a chilled gust of wind blew against him, sending shivers down his spine.

And that was when he heard movement.

But it was different this time. It wasn’t the sound of the disheveled footsteps of a patron of the sake bar down the street. Nor were it the footsteps of a person rushing to get home, desperate for a good night’s sleep, but in fear of being caught alone by someone like him—not that he would ever dare to lay a finger on those people. Never would he ever.

Instead, it was the sounds of conflict, coming from a distant point from where he sat, almost out of earshot, but the cause of such noise was clear to him as day.

Metal trash cans crashing against each other. Piles of bricks falling off their foundation, cluttering on the ground. Shouting. Yelling. A single pained cry.

“Stop, please, just _stop_!”

Namjoon stood up. The air around him went still as he tried to focus on the voices that echoed in the distance.

“We do not appreciate filthy traitors within our ranks, and your pathetic little group’s attempt to defy us has not gone unnoticed, nor should it go unpunished.”

That manner of speech, the choice of words, the scorn and disgust behind that second voice—it stirred something from within Namjoon. He was clenching his jaw now and curling his hands into fists, his eyebrows furrowing as his entire posture tensed, his eyes now set on a new goal.

He knew that speech all too well.

There wasn’t a single hint of hesitation within Namjoon as he sprung into immediate action; he turned on his heel and ran across the roof onto the next, each step bringing himself closer towards the source of those noises. He didn’t stop until he was looking down upon the site of the conflict, and found a group of red-cloaked figures—there were about eight of them in total—all towering over a single, cowering figure, cornered against a dead end, chest caving with deep, ragged breaths and a single gloved hand over what he assumed was a wound in the abdomen, dripping with blood.

None of them had yet to notice Namjoon’s presence there, allowing him some time to assess the situation which, to be honest, did not need much time to decipher at all. There was no doubt that every single person there was a ghoul, and he knew all too well who the cloaked individuals were—the black crow symbol stitched onto the back of the blood-red fabrics told him more than enough information needed. Three of them had _koukaku kagune_ , one of them a _bikaku_ user and two were _rinkaku_ users, while two in the middle had rifles in hand, but from the looks of it, they didn’t seem to be too strong—he knew that the people their larger group dispatched for missions like these wouldn’t be any of the too-higher-ups—but he could still be wrong, and he had to expect anything in a situation like this.

The single, injured ghoul in the corner told a different story. He sported short black hair and a black mask covered in metal spikes that only covered the lower half of his face, allowing his black, red-irised _kakugan_ eyes to be exposed, but there was an evident small line of blood trailing from the bottom of his mask down to his neck. He wore an all-black attire, but the blood pouring from the fresh-inflicted wound in his stomach area was beginning to stain his black shirt that was torn around the edges, signs of a nasty fight.

“Look,” the injured ghoul gasped out to the hooded figures, taking a sharp intake of breath as his eyes narrowed just the slightest bit, wincing. “I’ll leave—far away from here. I won’t come back. Just… spare us, _please_. We won’t come back, I promise.”

The hooded ghoul ahead of the rest of his group scoffed at the feeble pleas, tilting his head to the side before shaking it in what seemed to be disappointment.

“Tsk, you foreigners have no shame, do you?” His blue _kagune_ was then wrapped around his arm, forming a sharp slicing blade almost reminiscent, but no doubt weaker, to Namjoon’s. He raised his weaponized arm high, the flesh-blade glinting underneath the single, flickering lamp post that illuminated the shadowed alleyway. “You know, I was thinking of disposing each and every one of you, one by one. It wasn’t like the rest of you had any value left to further the purpose of our organization, anyway. I suppose this gives me a reason to kill all of you now.”

As soon as the man raised his arm and pointed it towards the injured ghoul, Namjoon acted without thinking; he felt his own _kakugan_ forming, as well as his own _kagune_ wrapping around both his arms, forming his own pair of weapons, as he stepped off the edge of the roof he was standing on, dropping down to the ground below, standing right in between the injured ghoul and the menacing cloaked group.

He lifted his arm right as the leader went to strike down, causing hardened flesh to strike against hardened flesh instead. It caught the leader by surprise, and Namjoon could hear an audible gasp from behind the familiar, off-white skull-like mask the leader wore—one that, he quickly noticed, was also worn by each of the cloaked ghouls in that same alleyway. With a smirk, he thrusted his other bladed arm into the stomach of his opponent, the _kagune_ piercing through bone and flesh and to the other side of the ghoul’s body, before he flung his arm to the side, bringing the leader along with it and throwing him to the wall beside them, crashing straight onto a brick-less path before he tumbled down face-first onto the pile of broken bricks below.

And that was when Namjoon realized his mistake, as he looked up and saw the other members of the small group also realizing what just happened, their _kakugan_ eyes flashing behind their masks.

Would he be able to go up against all eight ghouls at once—even if they were B-rated at best? Well, he was about to find out.

But that was the problem—dueling with a single ghoul was a challenge enough on its own, depending on their rating. All of that were thrown out the window into the back dumpster, however, if he was going up against an entire _group_ of ghouls.

It was a different story he’d hoped he’d never have to experience any time soon, but he had no choice but to deal with it _now_.

Namjoon was a strong ghoul—he didn’t earn his own rating for nothing—and he could fight like hell, but if he could choose, he’d rather not. He used his _kagune_ for defensive purposes more often than putting himself in the offense, but for now, he had to adapt.

He solidified the flesh surrounding his arms, increasing its mass to cover the entire length of his limbs to prevent them from being sliced off as soon as one of the _koukaku_ ghouls rushed towards him with their own organ, morphed into a giant knife. Namjoon blocked the attack with his arms once more, then jerked his left arm downwards to deflect a green _bikaku_ tail that aimed to swipe him off his feet. He then spun around and kicked the ghoul in front of him in the chest, pinning his opponent to the ground.

Namjoon then jumped up, using the height advantage he gained as he stretched out his _kagune_ , forming long appendages that attacked the two ghouls with the sharpened tips at once, stabbing into their shoulders and slamming them into each other, incapacitating them and causing them to drop their weapons that clattered on the ground. Retracting his weapons, he dove down and dug his feet into another one of the skull-masked ghouls, pushing and pinning them to the ground as well, then slashed at another.

This time, however, the person he was aiming at dodged him, and instead retaliated with a _rinkaku_ tentacle that smashed onto his abdomen, knocking air out of his stomach and sending him staggering backward. He caught himself just on time, though, as he ducked down and narrowly avoided the attack of another enemy, watching as they staggered forwards instead. Namjoon took this opportunity and thrusted one arm into the unaware ghoul, eliciting a sharp grunt before it died down as the ghoul began to choke on his own spitting blood then fell off Namjoon’s bladed arm, falling limp to the ground.

One dead, two more down, five more to go. He might need to make things a bit bloodier this time around.

At this point, the leader he’d incapacitated a while ago had recovered himself, and a loud growl coming from the end of the alleyway alerted Namjoon to his presence, giving him just enough time to raise his arms again to act as a shield that the leader’s _kagune_ blade clashed straight against, the impact of which repelled them for a split second before the two were held face-to-face with each other in a stalemate, both ghouls holding their ground for as long as they could with their feet gradually sliding against the concrete ground.

Namjoon gritted his teeth, well-aware that holding this position would leave him vulnerable to the attack of the other cloaked ghouls—he saw the others behind the leader rushing up to aid their comrade, and was prepared to flinch away from the leader to start defending himself once more, until a miracle came his way; he watched as three of them clustered together and running towards him suddenly being knocked over and sent flying left and right to either walls. He peeked over the leader’s shoulder to see a relieving sight, that of the injured ghoul with the spiked mask from earlier on his feet, a hand still clutching his wound but he was crouched down with a bright orange _bikaku_ tail wrapped around his leg, eyes glaring at the ghouls he’d just incapacitated before rushing forward to drive his own hand into one of the cloaked ghouls, grabbed onto the flesh inside and threw the entire body towards one of his friends on the other wall, breathing heavily after he’d done so.

A flicker of hope was just about to light up inside of Namjoon until he heard the sound of more people coming from around the corner behind him, at least about five more individuals—their backup, perhaps, judging from the sound of boots instead of dress shoes. He wasn’t sure the two defending ghouls could handle more people, but he was going to try.

“I know who you are,” the leader growled from behind the mask, _kakugan_ eyes narrowing at Namjoon. “Don’t think we’ve forgotten about you, Kim Namjoon—it’s about time that we put you down as well. You come here looking for death, and so I shall grant it to you!”

He pulled his blade back then, giving Namjoon some space to regain his breath and strength before the leader let out a loud growl and tried to strike Namjoon in the head. The latter sidestepped just in time, but was too slow to retaliate back with an attack of his own before the leader used his momentum to sweep his bladed arm in Namjoon’s direction, avoided when Namjoon jumped up and flipped backwards, landing on his feet the way a cat would.

He didn’t need to turn around to know that behind him, there was another fight going on between the black-dressed ghoul and the rest of the group, but Namjoon couldn’t do anything much to help him as he found himself being struck with various haphazard attacks from the leader once again. He tried to avoid and dodge them the best he could, all the while trying to put as much distance between them as possible, jumping to the wall and extending his _kagune_ arms once more to try and take advantage of the distance, failing when the leader managed to escape the attacks as well.

So, they’d sent out someone more than capable in handling themselves on the field this time around. _Fucking great_.

Namjoon dove back down to the ground on the other side of the narrow space when the leader launched himself to where the former was, leaving the latter stunned and sliding down the wall he leaned against. Namjoon used the open chance and charged forwards, swinging his fists left and right and ended up driving one of his bladed arms into the wall that coughed out brick rubble back out. He couldn’t yank them out in time for the leader to take a step back and drive his boot onto Namjoon’s chest, knocking him to the side, for Namjoon to once again recover his stance mid-air and land on his feet skidding against the ground.

Just then, their backup just arrived around the corner—five similarly cloaked, skull-masked individuals with rifles in their hands—some of which pointed their weapons straight at Namjoon, and about two were pointing past him, at the other ghoul who’d became his unwitting ally. A couple of clicks coming from their direction prompted Namjoon to raise his arms up to shield his face, expanding his _kagune_ to take the hit instead—

Until a blizzard of crimson rained from the skies above like a downpour of blood, knocking three of them to the ground in a blink of an eye, their bodies spurting small fountains of blood. Namjoon lowered his arms then, gazing past his opponent’s shoulder—and the leader himself had heard the commotion behind him and was looking over his own shoulder to the sight of his comrades pinned to the ground, familiar-looking red crystal shards the size of an adult hand jabbed into the flesh of the dead ghouls.

“Aish, why did you start the party without me? I would’ve liked a fun little exercise, too.”

And sure enough, Namjoon looked up, and standing on top of the building to his left was Yoongi with his white mask on, dressed in a black coat and slacks, orange-red flames sprouting from his shoulders, _kakugan_ eyes flashing red as he jumped down into the fray, the remaining two ghouls instantly reacting upon the newcomer’s presence and started shooting bullets at him, which he dodged with ease as he waved a single wing and slammed it against one of the cloaked ghouls, then moved to kick the other one in the face towards the wall behind him, then grabbed his throat and threw him to the ground, before driving another wing into the back of the cloak, the thrashing body falling limp with a grunt.

Pulling his attention away from the sight of his friend, Namjoon heard the rush of footsteps behind him just in time for him to leap up and dodge an incoming attacker. He stretched out his _kagune_ , the sharp tip stabbing into his attacker straight through the chest then casting the limp body out to the side. With both arms stretched out, he then slammed both enlarged appendages down onto where the leader had been standing as he fell back down to his feet, before straightening his posture and allowed his _kagune_ to retract, but with his resolved will, he wasted no time as he surged forwards and allowed his _kagune_ to split and wrap around the leader’s throat—or what he could grasp of it inside the large cloak—then heaved the body against the wall, chipping off more brick rubble, and pinned him there.

He almost didn’t catch the sight of Yoongi throwing some more shards towards the group leader, a couple narrowly missing Namjoon’s _kagune_ arm but all piercing into the enemy’s body, hanging him up there like wet laundry. He also didn’t miss one last remaining lackey running up to him from the side, perhaps in an attempt to save his leader, but Namjoon made one quick movement to drive his other arm into the henchman’s stomach, effectively stopping the latter in his motion before falling limp like the rest of his fallen comrades.

Another figure appeared in the corner of his eye—the injured ghoul from earlier, his orange tail dissolving back to mere cells in the specialized organs all ghouls possessed—who stood on the opposite side of Namjoon, who shifted his attention back to the leader ghoul, staring at the familiar skull mask, now chipped off in the right corner of the jaw.

“This is not over, you know,” the defeated ghoul rasped through ragged breaths, his arrogant smirk evident beneath the chipped-off side of the mask that devolved into choking laughter that spat back out blood, little droplets of crimson landing on Namjoon’s _kagune_ arm that made the latter flinch in disgust. “My superiors will find out about this, and they will find you— _all_ of you. I can assure you, the price of betrayal will be paid back in blood, and they will make sure of this.”

Namjoon was about to retort back when the unnamed ghoul from earlier beaten him to it first.

“I’d like to see you savages _try_ ,” the metal-masked ghoul hissed back at his attacker, but a slight cough at the end of his speech indicated that he was still in pain regardless of everything.

The leader tilted his head towards him then, laughing in malice. “Oh, no worries. I’m sure my comrades will find the rest of your pathetic little group soon enough. Killing me won’t do anything much to prevent that, I’m afraid.” Then he turned back to Namjoon and continued, “And as for you, Aogiri has special plans for you, Kim Namjoon. Don’t worry; we have certainly not forgotten about you _or_ that weakling of a brother of yours. They will find you soon enough, as well.”

“Good,” Namjoon stated then, not the slightest hint of fear or hesitation evident in his voice even though the dying ghoul’s words were burned into the back of his mind, and was going to last there for a while. “Let them come, then. I’ll be counting on it.”

He didn’t let the other ghoul speak any further before he tightened his grip around the cloaked ghoul’s neck even further, forcing all of his breath out of him, then drove his other _kagune_ arm straight through the man’s head, piercing through the skull, blood spurting out of him.

Once he was sure the ghoul had gone limp and was dead for good, Namjoon released his grip, allowing his _kagune_ to disintegrate and his RC cells to retract back. He was breathing hard now, looking down to see that patches of blood had stained his clothes and frowned at them in irritation. There was no way he was walking straight into a convenience store looking like this.

But something else to keep in mind: he needed to put himself back into shape—and fast, if what the cloaked ghoul said earlier had been true.

Aogiri Tree was still looking for him, and Taehyung, too. He was in deep trouble now.

“Aogiri Tree, Namjoon?”

The tall ghoul turned around then, facing his cat-masked friend who’d crossed his arms across his chest and was glaring at him, though his eyes had returned back to their normal, dark-irised orbs.

“You were involved with those damn, good-for-nothing terrorists?”

“You two are Koreans?”

The two ghouls froze, turning their heads to the still-injured unnamed ghoul who was looking back and forth between both Namjoon and Yoongi, normal-looking eyes with dark brown irises and white cornea wide and cautious and wary, knowing full well how much the two ghouls were capable of handling themselves in a fight.

Yoongi remained less than pleased after eyeing the stranger up and down. “And you are?”

The stranger then extended his gloved hand outwards towards Yoongi, who merely glared at the hand and made no move to shake it.

“Jung Hoseok,” the stranger introduced himself, and gave a small nod of understanding before retracting his hand back when he realized Yoongi was not as friendly as he’d hoped. “Or J-Hope of the group Neuron—at least, what’s left of it, anyway.”

Namjoon frowned at the sour tone at the end of the sentence. “What do you mean, ‘what’s left of it’?”

The stranger—Hoseok—scratched the back of his head in uneasiness. “You’ve dealt with Aogiri before, haven’t you? My friends and I—we started out as a dance group, to be honest, and we had no intentions of doing organized killings like some other groups do, or anything like that. When Aogiri took over our ward, they forced us to work with them— _for_ them, actually. I heard they were working for the betterment of ghoulkind so I was fine with it at first… Then things went sour after that.”

“You tried to get out it, didn’t you?” Namjoon guessed, and Hoseok nodded without hesitation.

“They’re like a freaking cult or something, and it doesn’t help that we don’t even know who’re the higher-ups we’re working for—they kept saying we’re serving the ‘One-Eyed King’ but nobody’s ever seen him. Then they started treating us like shit, and we saw some horrible things—the stuff of nightmares—while we’re in there, so we started thinking of bailing the second we get the chance to, but…”

Hoseok then gestured towards the dead ghouls around the three of them, sighing deeply.

“What about your friends?” Namjoon asked next, and Hoseok’s frown deepened.

“I have no idea,” he admitted, worry etched into his voice. “We split up as soon as we found out they sent men after us to hunt us down—we’d thought we could lose them then reconvene somewhere safe, but it appears that might not be the case.”

“We can help you find them.” Namjoon couldn’t stop himself from offering his help to the injured ghoul, eyes wandering to the hand that was still clutching the wound though he was sure that blood had stopped flowing—a small meal would allow the wound to heal, no doubt about that, but of course food was starting to become scarce around these parts. He couldn’t help but reminisce back to when he’d met Yoongi and offered the latter the same helping hand, and while the usually-embittered ghoul had accepted his aid at the time, Hoseok shook his head, even more so when he looked to the side and noticed Yoongi’s glare burning into both Namjoon and Hoseok.

“You’ve done more than enough for me,” Hoseok replied with a firm nod, “and it seems like you’ve got your own bone to pick with those Aogiri bastards, and from the looks of it, you’ll be fighting your own battles with them soon—I wouldn’t want to bother you with my problems as well. I’m sure I can find them myself.”

Namjoon heard Yoongi scoff, and could’ve sworn that he also heard him mutter under his breath something along the lines of ‘good riddance’. Ghouls, however, had more sensitive senses than regular humans, and Hoseok no doubt caught those words, but kept a straight face anyway.

“Are you sure you’ll be all right? We have food and shelter, you know.”

“I’ll be fine—I’ll live.” Hoseok swallowed hard, taking his hand off his wound for a brief moment to check its condition. He sure didn’t look as fucked up as Yoongi was the other night, evident by the fact that he could still stand and fight. He then readjusted his mask back over his face, but the gratefulness was evident in his eyes as he looked back at Namjoon and very briefly at Yoongi. “Thank you for saving me back there, by the way—I don’t think I’ll be able to beat all of them at once without your help, and for that I’m grateful. So, if you ever need help in the future, well… I’m sure we’ll cross paths again someday.”

He turned around before Namjoon could say anything in response and jumped up, landing on the roof and disappearing from sight in an instant. He couldn’t protest this time around, and was too drained and tired to do anything anyway, wincing when he began to feel Yoongi’s burning gaze fixated onto his back, as though the latter had shot more _kagune_ crystals into him this time around, clearly still displeased from what had just transpired within the short amount of time he’s been here.

“Namjoon.” The irritation was clear in the elder ghoul’s voice, much like it was when Namjoon tried to wake him up from one of his beloved naps that one and only time. “Explain.”

Namjoon sighed, turning around to face his _hyung_ once more, grimacing at how ironic the cat face staring back at him was.

“I’ll explain on the way home.”

Dealing with other ghouls was difficult, and dealing with organized groups was even harder. But with some extra numbers and the right amount of teamwork, any single ghoul could always pull through and emerge victorious.

Namjoon had a feeling he’ll be needing those numbers real, _real_ soon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading!


	3. We Are Bulletproof, Pt. 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, I finally managed to finish another chapter. And this is also technically part one of the full chapter, then I had to cut it to half because it was getting up to 20 pages and that's way too long. But hey, just saying, there's more to this chapter and I'll finish it up soon enough. Should be up later today as I continue procrastinating on studying for finals.  
> Enjoy!

Moving was something the Kim brothers were all too used to, and something they wished they didn’t have to do again.

Namjoon hoped this time was the last.

Being used to something like this meant neither of them had many belongings to carry around to begin with—clothes, amenities, other personal belongings, all of which could fit inside each of their backpacks, the same ones they brought with them during their last move from Seoul to Tokyo. Furniture could be replaced, along with any electronics—with the exception of the laptop shared between them, that is. Then again, there was a lack thereof said electronics but the television, the only other object in the safe house that required electricity to run and was used on a daily basis, its sole purpose being to keep Taehyung occupied so his mind wouldn’t start worrying about Aogiri as much as Namjoon had for the past few months.

So far, it’s been doing a great job of serving its purpose, until Namjoon came back home that night after encountering those Aogiri goons and told Taehyung they needed to move— _again_.

Now, his brother was moving to the corner of the room where the electric sockets were, yanking out one of the plugs then beginning to pack up the cable, then bent over to pick up the silver laptop the cable belonged to, until someone’s voice cut through the room like a sharp, quick arrow.

“Yah! That’s mine, you idiot!”

Taehyung almost dropped the laptop in shock, eyes wandering to where Yoongi was sitting in his side of the room, eyes glaring at the younger ghoul, and all Namjoon could do was shake his head.

It came as a surprise to him that despite what happened last night, Yoongi had chosen to remain with them—keeping true to his words, Namjoon explained the full extent of his past affiliations to his elder. Then Yoongi started to chuckle as soon as he was finished, then, much to Namjoon’s further shock, admitted he would’ve joined Aogiri himself, having been tempted with the same offer of better lives and more power that they made to every single ghoul they’ve ever tried to recruit. That was, until he became aware of the restrictiveness and lack of freedom their members suffered in exchange—it was like signing themselves over to a sinister cult with malicious intentions that no doubt misaligned with his own.

“They’re torturing their own members,” Yoongi had scoffed then, a bitter scowl across his face. “I had a friend there once—a bit arrogant, that asshat—tempted with that exact same offer. Then he told me about the things he saw in there: him and a bunch of others were reduced to slaves doing menial labor, this blind, undying loyalty they had to the ‘One-Eyed King’ or whatever it was, someone who no one has ever seen before, and I don’t think that even the higher-ups know what this supposed ‘King’ looks like. Then there’s the fact that one of the executives—they call him ‘13th Ward Jason’—actually does torture people just for shits and giggles. And he’s one of those freaks who broke out of Cochlea before—yeah, there’s no way in hell I’m messing around with those guys.”

“You’re an S-rated ghoul, though, right?” Namjoon mused, giving his friend a sideways glance. “I’ve seen you on the news before. I’m surprised they haven’t gone out of their way to recruit you themselves.”

“Yeah, about that…” The older ghoul sighed. “I killed a few _Yakuza_ members a long while ago—about a few days when I first got here. I didn’t know who they were or _what_ they were, but it got the attention of the CCG for a little bit—speaking of which, they gave me that stupid nickname because they thought I was a girl for some reason, maybe because of the mask or my height—then months passed and I heard about those awful things from my friend, then one night, a group of three ghouls approached me out of nowhere and tried to recruit me. You know, those _Yakuza_ guys weren’t too pleased that I killed off a few of their members, then there’s the CCG on my back, so I had to lay low for a bit and I couldn’t move around and hunt for food as much as I’d like. When those three little smartasses insisted I join them, I… might’ve lost my temper and snapped them in half. I was starving at the time, so…”

A chill ran down Namjoon’s spine at the mere thought of it—he’s committed such horrors himself, making him a hypocrite, but it had been one time, and memories of his terrible past would still come back to him in the form of nightmares keeping him up and awake for countless nights. Hearing someone else talking about going through the same experience, however...

“I went a little off the rails for a bit after that—consequences of cannibalism, I guess, is that it drives you mad—which brought even more attention on me. Forced me to put up with disguising myself as a human for longer than I liked, but then it kinda help me get my mind back on track. I’ve been killing less since, not just because I needed to keep myself off the doves’ radar as well as Aogiri’s, but I suppose walking amongst prey brought me down to their level—it’s pathetic to be a sympathizer, I know, and I hate myself for going through this level of self-degradation when I know things’ll get worse for me in the long run, but so what? I don’t have much left to live for, come to think of it. But hey, for what it’s worth, I haven’t been doing that whole cannibalizing thing for a while now—a one-time thing, never intend to look back.”

“Until you tried to kill me.” Namjoon cracked a small smile. “And eat me for dinner.”

“Hey, I apologized, didn’t I?” Yoongi glared at him then, his scowl replaced with a somewhat child-like frown, almost reminiscent of Taehyung’s own pout whenever something didn’t go his way. “Again, I was desperate. And starving. That old man was gonna be my first decent meal in months and you had to ruin it. You pissed me off, so…”

Yoongi also made it clear that his initial negative reaction to Namjoon’s own affiliations with Aogiri was because he didn’t expect Namjoon to be one to fall for the temptation instead—though he twisted his words so it wouldn’t seem like he was complimenting the younger ghoul, the slighter ghoul thought Namjoon would be too smart to be lured into working for terrorists.

Granted, Aogiri claimed itself to be working for the betterment of all ghoulkind, but aren’t all terrorists like that—decent intentions with the wrong methods of execution?

Now, Yoongi was more displeased at the fact that sticking with the brothers meant relocating with them as well. He had minimal baggage, too, though—a few pieces of clothing, simple belongings and his own second-hand laptop that he didn’t let anyone touch, which explained his annoyance at Taehyung’s actions earlier. A pair of old headphones were usually plugged into the device and covering both of Yoongi’s ears whenever he wasn’t asleep or out hunting with Namjoon, who assumed the former was working on his music, having mentioned something along those lines before.

Namjoon himself wished he’d have more time to work on his own material, but maybe after the move, he’d be granted more time, what with the fact that he had a partner now he could collaborate with.

Yoongi was still grumbling to himself now, moving over to the wall with the sockets to reclaim the device that held his life’s work to pack it into his own bag. He huffed out a breath as he struggled to fit it back inside; Namjoon used this chance to make his way over to the elder ghoul, sitting down with crossed legs right next to him as he moved to assist him in packing.

“ _Hyung_ ,” Namjoon called out to the black-clad ghoul, who, though didn’t turn to look at him, was no doubt paying attention. “You know you don’t have to come with us, right? You could go back to whatever place you were living before. You don’t have to deal with Aogiri like we do.”

Upon hearing this, Yoongi looked up, turned to him with a glare, and curled his lips back. “I’m quite sure some months ago, the two of you stubborn asses insisted that I stay, and now you’re kicking me out? Such kindness indeed.”

He snapped the zippers shut with a little more force than necessary, startling Namjoon.

“I’m not kicking you out,” Namjoon then said, frowning at the older ghoul. “We want you to come with us—Taehyung’s obviously grown attached to you, and he likes having friends, something he lacks since we’ve been here—but you’re putting yourself in unnecessary crosshairs here. You said so yourself; you’d like to stay away from Aogiri as much as possible. Coming with us meant you’d be put back pretty high up their wanted list.”

“If so, then bring it on—I’ve had about enough of running. It’ll be nice to stretch my muscles out for once—our fight didn’t count, by the way, because I was holding back _a lot_.” Namjoon rolled his eyes as Yoongi gave his backpack a thorough pat-down. “And besides, I still owe you one. Seems fair, you know? You scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours—you saved my ass, I’ll save yours.”

Namjoon frowned. “And when that debt is paid?”

“We’ll see.” Yoongi gave him an enigmatic look that he couldn’t decipher, but there was a quick flash of what Namjoon could’ve sworn was the ghost of a small smile. “But I suppose hanging out with you guys isn’t all too bad. It certainly isn’t the worst-case scenario I can think of.”

Namjoon knew full well that Yoongi just didn’t want to admit the fact that he’s grown fond of the two of them, which was rather expected coming from him. With both Namjoon and Yoongi having a passion for music, the two once promised to collaborate on something together, perhaps after things with Aogiri settled down and they were all having much more stable lives.

Meanwhile, Taehyung peeked over Yoongi’s shoulder during one of their quieter days once and his eyes settled upon the page-worth of lyrics attached to an open project, singing along to the melodies leaking out of Yoongi’s headphones. Yoongi being Yoongi, he scowled at the younger ghoul for poking his nose into places he shouldn’t, but then told him—muttered under his breath, but Namjoon’s enhanced hearing allowed him to pick it up from around the corner—that once the piece was finished, if possible, he’d like Taehyung to be the voice behind the lyrics.

Namjoon stared at his _hyung_ now, suppressing his own chuckle at the thought. _Hyung_. Indeed, Yoongi was like a brother to them now. Not the replacement brother, never in a thousand years, Namjoon thought. Just… a new brother. A different brother, appreciated all the same.

“Speaking of which…”

Namjoon blinked and looked back at Yoongi, whose eyes were still staring at the surface of his backpack.

“Do you have an idea of _where_ we’re going to relocate?” the older ghoul asked then, before turning his eyes to Namjoon with an expectant gaze—a gaze that was returned with a solemn frown.

“I’m not quite sure yet,” Namjoon admitted, scratching the back of his head. “Is your old place available by any chance?”

To this, Yoongi shook his head. “Not taking that risk. Last I heard from people I know back there, there’s too many ghouls, too many doves and too few humans out and about. Unless you want to go down _that_ road again, you know, but I think I’ll pass this time around. I’d rather stay here than go back _there_.”

Namjoon sighed. He was running out of options. It wasn’t like he was looking for vacant spaces each time he roamed out into the city. Perhaps he should’ve. Perhaps, he should’ve considered the possibility of a situation like this ever happening, considering their current status as refugees.

Somewhat illegal, undocumented, immigrant refugees. Which, of course, didn’t help with things such as looking for a decent place to rent.

“I know a place we can go.”

Both ghouls turned their heads to the other side of the room, where Taehyung was packing up the brothers’ own shared second-hand laptop, not even looking towards either of the two ghouls until he was sure the laptop was secured inside his backpack. It was a short glance up, perhaps after the deafening silence that followed after his rather nonchalant comment, and was indeed met with both his brother’s and Yoongi’s questioning glares.

“What?”

“I know a place,” Taehyung repeated, then turned around to gather his small collection of _manga_ books kept behind his mattress. “Okay—I might or might not have made a friend a little while ago when I was out looking for the latest volume of _One Piece_ , and he may or may not be coincidentally a ghoul who works at a ghoul restaurant.”

“Ghoul restaurant?” Yoongi frowned in disgust. “You mean, that shady-ass society who kidnaps humans and tortures them for fun before devouring them? Yeah, I think I’ll pass.”

“No, not _that_ ‘restaurant,’” Taehyung sighed. “I meant like a legitimate establishment that serves food to ghouls—and humans, too, but that much is obvious.”

A thought came into Namjoon’s mind: “Wait, are you talking about the cafe in the 20th ward? What was its name— _Anteiku?_ ”

Taehyung piped up upon hearing that name, but his shoulders deflated soon after. “Uh, sort of. Not quite. It’s in the 20th ward, too, but it’s not Anteiku. It serves more than just coffee—there’s an actual secret menu with human meat served up as different dishes. The owner and chef is a ghoul, too. I’m telling you, it’s a legitimate restaurant for ghouls.”

Another moment of silence. Namjoon was pondering it over—a glance at his brother showed that Taehyung seemed to be telling the truth of the existence of this ‘ghoul restaurant,’ but would it be his fault for doubting the younger ghoul? A secret menu, with dishes made of human flesh? Ghouls were known to be unable to consume anything _other_ than human flesh and innards, and of course, coffee. Anything else was repulsive to their taste palettes, an instant trigger for throwing up unless one had practice attempting to chew and swallow down human food and keep it in their stomach until they were in the clear to regurgitate them out again. How in the world would anyone be able to cook anything, from _human flesh_?

Well, there was one possibility… But that couldn’t be it, right?

Yoongi seemed to be thinking about it, too, but his doubts were more pronounced. “And you’ve been there? To this… restaurant thing?”

Taehyung gave them a firm nod. “I’m telling you, it’s the real deal. I checked it out the other day with my friend. The owner gave us a free meal, then we got to chat and everything… My friend—he’s also like us, by the way. He’s a Korean refugee, too, but the owner found him and took him in, let him stay there as long as he helped out in the dining room and the kitchen sometimes. Maybe he can offer the same thing for us?”

“How do you know he will even want to listen to us?” Yoongi scoffed. “I’m pretty sure that buddy of yours got a clean slate. Us, on the other hand…”

“I’m sure if we explained it to him, he’ll understand. He’s one of us, you know.”

“It’s an option worth considering.” Yoongi now turned to stare at Namjoon as soon as he spoke up, the latter sighing before continuing, “We don’t have much to begin with, _hyung_. If this acquaintance of Tae’s is helping fellow ghouls out, then maybe—”

“What if it’s a trap?” Yoongi shook his head. “You know how people like us are. The scum of the earth despicable enough to lure humans in like predators luring their prey. What if we end up as one of the prey? Cannibalism isn’t a rare occurrence among us any longer, you know?”

“Well, don’t you trust _me_?”

Both turned back to Taehyung, frowning at Yoongi’s implications.

“I trust them,” Taehyung insisted, standing up to his feet, eyebrows furrowed. “So trust me.”

“You do know we still need to talk about you talking to other people—other _ghouls_ , in particular?” Namjoon inquired to his brother, whose gaze turned to the floor as soon as this was brought up. “Something I specifically told you not to.”

“I mean, he just kinda came up to me and told me he was a ghoul, too,” the latter shrugged. “He promised he would keep my secret if I kept his. He’s a fan of _One Piece_ , too, you know. We borrowed from each other’s collections, too, sometimes. Stuff he has that I don’t, stuff that I have that he doesn’t…”

The oldest of the three stood up before neither brother could do anything about it. “Wait, are you saying you _invited_ him here? _He knows where we live?_ ”

Namjoon sighed. “Tae…”

And Taehyung hung his head low, sitting back down. “I’ll explain to you both when we get there, okay?”

 

* * *

 

The three ghouls departed at dusk, and though this old rundown building was not the home any of them were used to or expected for, Namjoon couldn’t help giving the living space one last glance-over before letting the door fall to a close on its own, shutting for good with a soft but echoing _click_ that continued to ring in his ears minutes after.

The sun was no longer in sight beyond the horizon, or perhaps blocked with Tokyo’s ever-impressive skyline, but its warm, soft glow was still lingering, coloring the skies with a beautiful gradient of orange and blue hues. Little dots of lights were beginning to blink into existence against the darkened backdrops of the walls of skyscrapers in the distance, and within a short amount of time, the darkness of dusk was overtaken with the bustling nightlife that Tokyo offered to its citizens.

It was uncommon for Namjoon to be heading out with company by his side, so he made sure to keep his pace even with theirs as to not leave them behind. After all, he was not in a rush as he normally would be—stealth and inconspicuous actions were more valued this time around than speed. They needed to blend in with the crowd as they travelled across the city, as to not arouse suspicion—nobody was supposed to know they were relocating themselves, not to mention having to avoid watchful eyes of doves wandering the streets, perhaps hidden in plain sight as much as they were.

Although, all three of them were wearing face masks—not their hunting masks, but rather disposable masks that the average citizens of Tokyo after wore, covering about half of their faces but enough to hide their identities from anyone who might recognize them.

The three managed to reach the train station soon enough, having enough money to procure tickets for all three of them, granting them a quick passage through the city center. After switching lines and trains a number of times, the ghouls reached the 20th ward of Nerima in a little over an hour.

With the exception of Taehyung, neither Namjoon nor Yoongi had ever gone to the 20th ward, not even after hearing rumors about Anteiku—in Namjoon’s defense, he thought that was what Anteiku ever was: a rumor. It was a miracle that any ghoul would be able to set up a proper, legitimate establishment and avoid suspicion from the CCG.

Among ghouls, the 20th ward was also rumored to be the most ‘peaceful’ out of other wards in the Tokyo Metropolis, ‘docile’ even. There were little turf wars happening around here, and few conflicts between ghouls and doves alike. Perhaps it was the fact that the ghouls living here were fewer in numbers—the scent of humans seemed to be much more overwhelming, something Namjoon noticed the second he exited the train—or maybe the ghouls here were just more passive compared to others in Tokyo.

Or maybe, it had something to do with those rumors surrounding the two warring factions prominent in Nerima—the Apes and the Black Dobers—as well as the notorious ghoul that went by the name of Kuzen, all happening in this ward, then the sudden disappearance of all three parties all together for some unknown reason.

Or it could also be because of the fact that there was a known possible organization here that kept all the ghouls fed.

Could be one or the other. And they were here to find out.

There wasn’t a drastic difference between Ōta and Nerima—both were located in the outskirts of town, so there were a number of tall buildings but not ones that pierced the atmosphere. There was a noticeable absence of the smell of sea salt, though, which was to be expected considering how Nerima was a good distance away from the shoreline, compared to Ōta which neighbored the sea.

It was a little later into the night now—a little over eight when Namjoon glanced over clock as the three of them made their way out of the station. Taehyung was almost bouncing with every step he made while Yoongi was the complete opposite of him, eyes narrow after taking a decent nap during the second half of their train ride, sluggishly dragging his feet a little behind the two of them.

Namjoon himself, on the other hand? Too busy thinking about their next move.

What if this acquaintance of Taehyung’s wasn’t willing to help them? What if it was a trap, like what Yoongi said? If this was legitimate, how long would they be able to stay there before they got kicked out? Would the owner’s hospitality extend so far?

“You do know where you’re going, right?”

Taehyung was leading the group now, after exiting the station and heading out to the streets. It was spring, so it was quite cold, enough that the three could feel it pricking their skin but not as intense as winters. Their masks were still up, but their voices were loud and clear, what with the streets out here being not as crowded as the train stations.

“Yes,” Taehyung replied at first, then paused, then added, “I think.” When Yoongi groaned and rolled his eyes, he continued, “I’ve been there once, but I’ve gotten us this far, haven’t I?”

“Getting on a train to the 20th ward is something a child can do.”

“Tae- _ah_ ,” Namjoon called out to his younger brother, interjecting the conversation before it got too far. “Do you remember what the restaurant’s called? We can ask around, you know.”

“Uh, I think it’s… _Ossu Seiromushi?_ It should be around here somewhere, I remember passing through here when I went there the first time…”

“Ah, _seiro-mushi_ .” _Makes sense, for a ghoul who couldn’t taste his own cooking if he did._

The oldest of the three shook his head again. “Are you even sure this place is still open? At this hour?”

Taehyung shrugged. “I’m sure they’re open for dinner hours.”

Of course, Namjoon had faith in his own brother, and it seemed that Yoongi did, too, to some extent, with him still following the two brothers roaming the streets, all three pairs of eyes scanning around their surroundings while basking in the relative peace and quiet of the night. Not a lot of establishments were still open and not a lot of people were out and about, which was something to be expected in these bordering parts of Tokyo.

There were, indeed, a few small groups of people and fewer individuals on the streets with them—families out for a nice warm dinner, business and corporate partners out to have a bottle of _sake_ or two. There was some indistinct yelling in the far distance, perhaps just a couple of youths out of their mind and picking a fight with each other. Doubtful that it would be ghouls out in the open like that, not with the reputation this ward had gained for itself.

It would be quite nice to settle here for a bit, he thought. Maybe Taehyung did have something going on here.

“This doesn’t look right.”

“It’s a shortcut,” Taehyung insisted, throwing a glance over his shoulder at Yoongi, who seemed more guarded than usual. “I remember going through here. I think it’s just around the corner—”

“You three seem to be quite lost there.”

Namjoon froze. A male voice spoke up from behind them—there’s something familiar about that voice, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on it, or recognize who it belonged to.

All he knew was that he had a bad feeling about this.

He turned around before Yoongi and Taehyung did, and saw a figure leaning against a wall not too far behind them. Something poked out of the corner of his mouth—a cigarette?—and he wore a hood over his head, shading his face from plain view.

“We’re not,” Namjoon quickly spoke before anything else happened, just as his other two comrades turned to look in the same direction. “We’re just passing through here—we know where we’re going.”

“Oh, do you?” The stranger pushed himself off the wall, arms crossed in front of his chest, head nodding in their direction. It was then when Namjoon noticed a mask was covering the lower part of the stranger’s face, but it wasn’t like the normal face masks, the ones they were wearing—it was a ghoul mask, no doubt about that. “If you did, you’d know this area’s off-limits. Hunting grounds are precious to us ghouls, you know? Of course, unless you’re human, which I know you’re not. Either that, or you’re not from around here.”

The stranger was blocking their path back now, as he took out the cigarette from in between his lips and threw it at the ground, stomping at the butt of the cigarette with one boot, extinguishing it with a slight _hiss_.

“As I said,” Namjoon said, putting more force behind his words this time. He wasn’t going to play nice if the other party wasn’t, not to mention the fact that he wasn’t alone, too. “We’re not looking for trouble—we’re just passing through here. We’ll be out of your hair in a minute.”

The stranger seemed to give this some thought, hanging his head off to the side for a bit as though pondering it over, his eyes not betraying a single hint of emotion, much less empathy.

“Oh, I don’t think so,” he said, something sinister now lacing his words. “For, as you can see, I’m part of this group—Aogiri Tree? Remember us?”

Namjoon drew in a sharp breath. From the corner of his eye, Yoongi stilled as well.

The stranger pretended to ignore this, checking the nails of his fingers peeking out of his black fingerless gloves, like a cat examining its claws. “Now, I’ve heard from a little birdie that one of my comrades and his squad ran into trouble with a couple of ghouls not too long ago—something about a traitor we’ve long thought dead, but turned up alive a little while ago. We lost a few good men that night, but one of our scouts managed to bear witness and reported back to us with this precious, precious intel.”

Namjoon was on his guard now—these people never wandered about on their own. He heard slight shuffling coming from Taehyung’s feet behind him, while Yoongi’s hand was starting to creep into his duffle bag. Namjoon, likewise, felt his fingers brushing over the cover flap of his book bag.

“Kim Namjoon,” the stranger spoke now, low and even. “You know the consequences of betrayal.”

_Shit shit shit…_

Just as expected, three figures dropped down behind the stranger—both of them cloaked, and, upon standing up to their feet, he noticed were wearing a familiar set of white, skull-like odd-shaped masks covering their entire faces. More noises came from right behind them soon after, prompting him to spin around just in time to see four more cloaked figures dropping down to their level, completely blocking their only other way out.

“We’re trapped…” he heard Yoongi muttering under his breath, followed with a curse through seething teeth. His hand was almost out of his duffel bag now, undoubtedly clutching something he picked up from it—his mask.

Namjoon didn’t want this to turn out to be a fight, but seeing how the three of them were being cornered between two groups of four ghouls and two walls, it seemed that he didn’t have much of a choice.

His hand slipped underneath the cover flap of his book bag, reaching into the front pocket where his fingers now brushed against the familiar canvas material of his beloved mask.

The muscles below his shoulder blade twitched.

“ _Hyung…_ ”

“Boy, oh boy.” The stranger clapped his hands once. “And it seems that your brother is here, too. It’s been a while since we last saw each other, Kim Taehyung. You know, you were among our best recruits. In a couple of years, you could’ve risen up to the top—be one of the executives, even. Too bad your pathetic, weak-minded brother pulled you out of our organization along with him and had you hiding from the rest of the world like a coward.”

The older brother was about to speak in defense of his younger sibling, but Taehyung beat him to it.

“I would never stand with savages like you,” the youngest growled low through a clenched jaw, a side of his brother that Namjoon never saw before but once. Taehyung, as innocent and outgoing as he might be, could no doubt be terrifying if he wanted to be. _It’s the innocents you needed to watch out for_.

“You left him for dead,” Namjoon interjected, careful not to lose his temper so quick like the others. He remembered this stranger now, and the reason his voice sounded so familiar: it was their former group leader, his direct supervisor and Aogiri executive, a ghoul he came to know of as Maro. “You could’ve sent reinforcements after him—after the entire squad. You could’ve saved them all, and yet, you didn’t. And here you are now, saying he should’ve stayed with you? After _you_ betrayed us?”

“I betrayed _you_?” Maro threw his head back, laughing at the Korean ghoul’s words. “That’s a good joke. Look, if it were up to me, I would’ve wanted to keep Taehyung with us. That incident in Shinagawa wasn’t supposed to play out the way it did. The squad was supposed to be filled with the failed recruits—the useless ones, the ones who weren’t going to make it. Taehyung wasn’t supposed to be there.”

“I don’t trust you,” was all Namjoon replied him with, eyes narrowed at the man he once used to put his faith into. There was no trust left in him now.

Maro, unfazed with this statement, shrugged indifferently. “Hmm. Not that it changes anything, anyway. We’re still going to kill you.”

Everything happened too fast; Maro launched himself to the air, his _rinkaku_ tentacles bursting out of his back and spinning behind him, then stretched out as he slammed himself back down to the ground, sending out a force wave that knocked Namjoon and Yoongi off their feet, sending them flying back a few meters and sliding against the ground. A cloud of concrete dust exploded into the air, and when Namjoon was able to recover himself, coughing and fanning dust away from his face, Yoongi was already up on his feet, a glimpse of his white cat mask already on his face before the older ghoul launched himself towards Maro, two crystallized _kagune_ wings arching over his back slashing at the Aogiri leader, who avoided them with a few steps to the side.

Maro spun around and attempted to slice back with his _rinkaku_ but Yoongi flipped backwards and slid back just in time to avoid their range. He then stretched out his two _ukaku_ wings and waved them towards Maro and the other three ghouls behind him, sending a giant wave of crimson shards in their direction. A good number of them pierced through the dark red cloaks, pinning the ends to the ground to prevent them from escaping on time, followed with groans of pain, but both of them knew this wasn’t the end of it.

Namjoon managed to fetch his own mask out of his bag and pulled it over his face, before his own Rc cells burst out of the skin beneath his shoulder blades, the familiar silver and purple tendrils wrapping around his arms and forming large knife-like blades on either limb. Behind him, Taehyung was scrambling to pull out his own mask from his backpack—a plain white mask that covered his entire face, much like Namjoon’s, with the exception of what looked like a black tear stain running down the left eye—pulled it over his face as his own _bikaku kagune_ burst out—a silver scorpion tail pulsing with purple beneath the metal-like shell, curling behind him, then whipped out in front of him just in time to block an attack from one of the ghouls blocking their path, his arms reaching out on instinct to block as well.

Without wasting time, Namjoon rushed to his brother’s side, pulling his arm back to thrust it towards his brother’s attacker, driving it straight to the side of his abdomen. He threw the Aogiri goon to the side and rushed towards the next ghoul, slicing his other blade towards them.

They wanted to pick a fight—and he was going to put up a fight indeed.  


	4. We Are Bulletproof, Pt. 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I could've done better. Is this good enough? I hope it is.  
> I'm rewriting chapter 1, by the way. It ain't up to standards in my book.  
> Also, happy birthday to our very own, worldwide handsome, fake maknae and king of dad jokes, Kim Seokjin.  
> Anyway, enjoy.

Taehyung wasn’t ready for a battle, but he had no choice.

Through the corner of his vision, he spotted one of the Aogiri lackeys in the back pulling out a rifle and began shooting at him; some of the bullets whizzed past him as he navigated his way through the others, sights set on his target, while some scraped his clothes and his  _ kagune _ tail. It stung for a few seconds but he ignored the pain, instead stopping right before colliding with his target and spun around, whipping his tail and slamming it against the ghoul, knocking the rifle out of his hands, before he followed it with a kick to the side of the ghoul’s face, knocking the ghoul themselves out with a single blow.

Out of instinct, as soon as his feet landed back to the ground, his tail whipped out once more, its pointed tip driving itself into his opponent’s abdomen, a spurt of blood bursting out and staining the silver sheen of his tail. Taehyung himself didn’t even realize having done that until he felt the warm droplets of blood on his extra appendage, drawing his tail back in an instant and flailed it around once, clearing the blood off of it.

He was too preoccupied with his own thoughts that he didn’t realize someone coming up from behind him, until something lashed at his feet and made him trip, his tail curling out from underneath him and allowing him to fall back on his feet, sliding against the ground and tilting his head up to face his new opponent.

Another one of those cloaked Aogiri soldiers, but there was something different about this one; his cloak was black, unlike the others’ which were dark red, and it didn’t cover his entire head, with some strands of short black hair peeking out from beneath the hood. His mask was different, too—it was round, a perfect white circle with two protruding circles above the mouth area, along with an upside down triangular shape above it, then there was a pair of long oblong protrusions on the top of the mask. Two pinhole black eyes stared back at him—was it in the shape of some kind of cartoonish animal? A rabbit, perhaps?

Behind the ghoul were three long but slender appendages— _ rinkaku  _ tentacles—pulsing with bright crimson, primed in an aggressive stance, hovering around him and their pointed tips directed towards Taehyung.

“Die, traitor,” the ghoul spat out, his voice somewhat soft despite his venom-laced words, before he launched himself towards Taehyung, his appendages lashing around him as Taehyung leaped forwards, dodging the appendages just in time before they hit him. He spun around again, aiming his tail towards the other ghoul who ducked at the right moment before he pounced at Taehyung, colliding head-on and sending both tumbling back towards the center of the battle where his two  _ hyungs  _ were occupied with taking out the other Aogiri goons, a quick glance at them showing him each were handling up to three at the same time.

_ Three _ . He should be able to take out just this one with ease, right?

_ No more _ , he thought to himself, clenching his jaw as he rolled over and pushed the other ghoul off of him. The ghoul landed on his feet, boots skidding against the concrete ground.  _ No more hiding. No more playing around. _

_ I can do this _ .

He rushed back towards the ghoul, whirled around and aimed the pointed tip of his tail towards him which he followed with another well-timed kick, the ghoul having dodged the  _ kagune  _ tail but not the kick. His foot struck a blow to the side of his stomach, causing him to be thrown off to the side and crashing against the wall beside them. The concrete cracked where the ghoul collided with it, but of course it wasn’t enough to knock him down; the ghoul peeled himself off the wall, his three appendages bursting to life once more before they surged towards Taehyung, striking down at him one at a time like piranhas nipping at his feet, but with enough force that it put small cracked dents on the ground with each strike.

Taehyung stepped backwards, avoiding each blow but was unable to dodge one that aimed at his upper half, catching him off guard, the pointed tip of a crimson tentacle piercing through his left shoulder. He grunted out in pain, feeling it driving a hole through his flesh before it pulled away, leaving a throbbing ache that pulsed through his entire left side and down his arm. His hand went up to clutch his shoulder, putting pressure over his wound before flailing his tail up in time to block another strike, then ducked and rolled over to dodge another one.

_ I can do this _ .

He was leaning on his good side now, lungs drawing in large amounts of oxygen and expelling carbon dioxide out in return, his breath sounding labored and drawn out. Blurred spots were beginning to cloud the corners of his vision as he struggled to blink them away, trying to focus in on the other ghoul who seemed to be taking a short pause of his own, his cloaked form heaving up and down with each deep breath he took.

_ I can do this _ .

A familiar pair of sneakers skidded backwards into view and stopped right beside him. Taehyung looked up to see the familiar silver sheen of his brother’s  _ kagune _ , then a little further upwards to see Namjoon struggling to maintain his own breath, drops of sweat sliding down the side of his face. The latter soon noticed Taehyung lying on the ground beside him, his attention immediately directed towards him as his eyes looked down at him in worry.

“Taehyung- _ ah _ .” His  _ kagune  _ unravelled itself from his arms for a brief moment, freeing his hands to grab Taehyung’s and pull his brother back up to his feet. “Are you alright?”

_ No.  _ “I’m fine,” he said instead, patting his brother’s back as a quick show of his appreciation. He swallowed his own blood back down his throat. “I’m fine.”

Namjoon shot him one final worried glance before letting his  _ kagune  _ re-wrap itself around his arms, forming the silver blades once more, then gave his brother a firm nod, which Taehyung returned as he watched his brother dive back into action, delivering calculated strikes and slices towards his opponents.

Taehyung then turned his attention back to his own rival, his focus a bit clearer than before, cracking his neck to the side as his opponent returned his appendages back to their offensive stance, feet positioned to move and strike.

He curled his fists and clenched his jaw.

_ I can do this. _

 

* * *

 

They were overwhelmed. Three against eight? As skilled as they might be, and even with both Yoongi’s and his experience in combat combined, Namjoon was starting to have a feeling that they might not actually come out of this alive.

He’d taken one out of the fight for good so far, Yoongi as well, but these guys were a lot tougher than the ones he fought a few nights ago. A few more had dropped into the fight—when the hell did they get here—replacing their fallen comrades and keeping the numbers stable, and the three overwhelmed.  Even more so with Maro being the one leading this squad—Maro was a man of high standards, so of course he would pick out the best recruits to fill out the spots in his squad. Taehyung was evidently having some trouble with one of them, despite having an advantage in terms of Rc type. Yoongi, being an  _ ukaku  _ user, was starting to get worn out as the battle continued to drag on, and with the large numbers, he couldn’t keep good distances from each and every one of them, putting him at a disadvantage with the short range.

Namjoon was getting exhausted as well, his arms were starting to ache, and he was having some difficulty catching up with his breath. He raised one of his blades to block an attack from another, altered flesh striking against altered flesh, giving him the chance to drive his other blade into the stomach of his attacker before throwing the limp body off to the side, just in time to duck another attack from another ghoul.

When he rose back up, he was unable to defend himself on time against an appendage hurling straight towards him, knocking him back a few meters, skidding against the hard concrete before his back slammed against the wall, earning him a few scratches against his side that would heal up with no problem, but he could feel a couple of his ribs inside his chest making his breaths more strained than it was before. He groaned in pain, lifting his head up just in time to see two large  _ rinkaku  _ appendages coming down at him, raising his two  _ kagune  _ blades to block the attack. They bounced off at first, but then began to attack him in rapid succession, not giving him the slightest window of time to recover or dodge away. He could feel them starting to chip away the hardened Rc cells making up his two blades, cracks running down its once-smooth surface, flakes of silver fluttering off then fading into nonexistence.

It was one of those few moments that he wished a miracle would happen—something,  _ anything  _ would happen. When he fought Yoongi the other night, he’d unleashed his  _ kakuja  _ state, not on purpose but it saved him right on time. But his latest instance of cannibalization had been relatively recent that time, and he had not fed on more Rc cells ever since, regaining his stable, right mind in the process, but in exchange, keeping his  _ kakuja  _ suppressed, perhaps too much than he liked to at this moment.

When he was defending that other ghoul a little while ago—Hoseok, was it?—Yoongi had jumped into the fray. He’d caught that group off-guard, which gave him an advantage, not to mention having Hoseok’s help as well.

This time, Maro’s group was prepared to fight him. He was the one caught off-guard. And Taehyung, his dear brother, as skilled as he might be, lacked the proper experience in combat. He was never one for physical battles in the first place. This was, no doubt and to some extent, Namjoon’s fault as well.

He could feel his Rc cells giving out as Maro’s  _ rinkaku  _ continued to punch through the hardened shell. His strength was starting to give out—how much longer could he keep this up, he wondered?

Across from him, he watched as Yoongi’s limp form was thrown across the space for a good distance before landing on the ground just a couple of meters away from him, face down on the concrete. The blazing wings sprouting from his shoulders were starting to give out as well, embers flickering and fading like the flames were being put out. The older ghoul let out one long groan before his  _ ukaku  _ diminished for good, nothing else as evidence of him still being alive other than his back still rising up and down with each labored breath he took.

“Yoongi- _ hyung _ …”

He grunted as another precisely delivered strike chipped away more of his  _ kagune _ , his breath seething through gritted teeth.

He gazed at the distance, where he saw Taehyung being tackled by another Aogiri member and thrown against the wall, trying to pick himself back up but struggling to do so.

“Taehyung- _ ah _ …”

His comrades… his  _ brothers _ …

Namjoon closed his eyes, and a familiar face came into mind as he swallowed hard. This might be it.

_ Hyung… I’m—  _

“Namjoon- _ ah _ ! Get up!”

His eyes snapped open. Through his ragged breaths, he noticed the hitting had stopped, and could even begin to feel his Rc cells reforming their web of bonds, his  _ kagune  _ retaking its former shape just as he began to lower them, unprepared for what he was about to see.

He was expecting Maro’s masked face staring down at him in malice and murderous intent; instead, he couldn’t resist breathing out a sigh of relief when he caught sight of a familiar figure looming over him, wearing a black mask that also covered the lower part of their face, but recognized its unique design of metal spikes covering the entire expanse of the leather material.

“Hoseok?”

Though he couldn’t see the smile behind the mask, the ghoul’s  _ kakugan  _ eyes narrowed to form crescents that showed just so.

“Good to see you, friend,” he greeted back, extending a helping hand out which Namjoon took without hesitation. His own  _ bikaku kagune _ , the orange appendage wrapped around the length of his leg. “Looks like you’re in a bit of a bind here.”

“Hoseok, where did you—”

“Ask the questions later, okay?” he quickly cut off before shoving Namjoon away before he side-stepped to avoid a  _ rinkaku  _ tentacle, coming off from Maro who had been pinned against the wall beside where Namjoon had been lying down near-defenseless. “Let’s kick some ass first, alright?”

Before Maro could deliver another strike, Hoseok sprinted towards him and landed another kick with a flip against the side of his face, before one of the lackeys pounced on him and he back-flipped on time to kick his attacker off towards the wall, giving Namjoon the opportunity to drive his blade through their chest, blood spurting out as the ghoul screeched in pain.

In the meantime, Hoseok made his way over to where Yoongi was lying motionless still, though at this point, Namjoon had a suspicion that Yoongi might be doing so on purpose, just having lost the will to even sit up anymore. Hoseok managed to pull the older ghoul to a sitting position, though, which Yoongi responded with a long groan that somewhat confirmed Namjoon’s suspicions.

“Up on your feet, soldier,” Hoseok joked, then glanced up over Yoongi’s shoulder to see someone rushing up to them with a  _ kagune  _ blade, ducking his head to avoid the attack. Before either of them could do anything, without prior warning, Yoongi’s two  _ kagune  _ wings burst back out from his back in instant crystallized form, piercing through the Aogiri ghoul, before letting them shrink back to their usual size and explode out of their crystal shell, back into flickering flames. He was then quick to draw his hands away from Hoseok’s and let them settle on his side, glaring up at Hoseok despite the latter’s rather cheerful disposition that was complete opposite to his own.

“How old are you again?” Yoongi asked, a slight scowl on his face as he tilted his head to the side like a curious, scheming cat.

“Nineteen,” Hoseok replied.

“Then you should address your  _ hyung  _ with proper honorifics, ‘soldier.’” Yoongi gathered himself back up to his feet, eyes still glaring at Hoseok. “And don’t wake me up from my nap next time, or I’ll skewer you myself.”

Before Hoseok could respond, Yoongi side-stepped around him and whipped one wing towards an advancing attacker, knocking them off their feet and thrown to the side.

Hoseok then turned to Namjoon, a questioning look in his eyes.

“He’s always like this,” Namjoon responded, as he caught sight of another ghoul heading in his direction from the corner of his eye. He spun himself around to face another attacker but was left stunned when instead, a figure dressed in white zoomed past him and Hoseok, instead heading straight to where Taehyung was being pinned to the wall by the ghoul who incapacitated him.

He lunged straight for the cloaked ghoul and tackling them to the ground, before rolling over and hurling the Aogiri goon off to a good distance before colliding with the wall. Namjoon blinked once then twice in disbelief—what just happened?

“Taehyung- _ ah _ !” the newcomer exclaimed with a light and soft male voice, and even more to Namjoon’s surprise, rushed over to the latter’s brother’s side, hands clasping around his forearms and shaking him awake before his eyes could flutter shut. “Are you alright?”

Taehyung was blinking his eyes open as Namjoon did a double-take on the newcomer. His white bomber jacket stood out among the crowd, while a number of silver spines with cyan inner coloring had sprouted from his shoulders, some curled to form somewhat like shoulder pads hovering over his form, others straight and longer, almost reminiscent of insect wings.

What caught Namjoon’s attention more than anything else, however, was that this newcomer spoke to his brother in Korean.

Taehyung, having gathered his composure, looked up at the newcomer, eyes widening in instant recognition.

“Jimin!” Taehyung wrapped his arms around the newcomer without warning, laughing in a mix of joy and relief. “You’re here! But how did you—”

“Find you? Know you were here?” The newcomer, Jimin, peeled himself away from Taehyung’s bear hug with a grin on his face. “I don’t. I just finished my shift and I was heading out to throw the garbage bags out in the back dumpster when I heard some commotion coming from back here and decided to take a look, break it off if things got bad. Turned out things got real bad here, didn’t it?”

“Namjoon.”

Namjoon tore his eyes away from the scene happening before him to address Hoseok, who lurched forward to dive out of the way of another ghoul lunging straight for him as he threw a look of disdain at his attempted attacker, before he made his way over to the former and spoke in a low voice.

“Is that one of yours?” he asked, nodding to the two ghouls standing at a good distance from them.

Namjoon pointed at his brother. “Taehyung, yes. As for the other one, I thought he was with you.”

Hoseok shook his head. “Never seen him before.”

Before the two could continue, Maro had recovered himself, pulling himself up to his feet then turned to address the two ghouls, who noticed this immediately and prepared themselves into a fighting stance.

“So,” Maro breathed out, the side of his mask cracked, exposing part of the skin underneath, while his left eye suffered quite the awful bruise. “You’ve managed to gather yourself a little pow-wow of friends of your own, haven’t you, Namjoon?” He laughed, his voice sounding strangled. “How pathetic.”

“At least I’m nothing like you,” he sneered through gritted teeth. “I do not abandon my own teammates—my friends, the people I  _ trust _ .”

Maro was chuckling now, almost guffawing, almost half insane. Perhaps he was, after all this time. He had that suspicion for a while now. “You see that?” Maro pointed at him with a crooked finger. “That right there—that’s going to get you killed, you know that? Empathy. It’s like poison. It’ll kill you when you least expect it.”

He then looked over his shoulder—at Yoongi, who was starting to regain his vigor and taking out two of his men at once, then at Taehyung and Jimin, who were working together to take down some of them as well. He turned back to Namjoon and Hoseok, both not missing the devious glint in his eyes which was staring past them over their shoulders, prompting both to turn around to see two advancing Aogiri goons looking to tackle them down.

Namjoon’s  _ kagune  _ shifted its form for a brief moment, melding together to form a shield that caught the delivered strike of a fellow  _ koukaku  _ user, a slicing cleaver that managed to cut down and reach the middle of Namjoon’s shield before his  _ kagune  _ rejoined itself, trapping the cleaver there. He then hurled the cleaver, and the ghoul it was attached to with it, towards the far wall, just as Hoseok had wrestled his way out of the grasp of his own assailant and kicked him, crashing straight into the path of Namjoon’s aggressor and slammed together against the wall, making a small pile of motionless bodies.

But when the two turned back to Maro, the Aogiri leader was no longer before them, and was instead seen sprinting down the passage, out of the heat of the battle and out of either of their reach. Both started after him, but halted to a stop when Maro jumped on the top of a dumpster, then leaped up to grab the ledge of the building across from it, propelling him upwards onto the roof and out of sight, leaving the two to catch their breaths and scowl in defeat.

“Maro- _ sama _ !”

The two whipped their head around as soon as a rasping but soft voice, watching as one of the cloaked ghouls—the only one wearing a black one, the one who was fighting his brother just moments ago—running past them, ignoring their presence as he stopped just in front of them, but his head and attention was still focused on his fleeing squad leader, catching the sight of the latter’s cloak fluttering behind him before it disappeared from view, leaving almost not trace of Maro ever being here behind.

“Maro- _ sama _ ?”

He sounded so defeated, the youth’s voice shaking and unstable, like he was falling apart. Namjoon could remember that feeling—remembered a similar voice calling out to him, to anyone who could hear him, just as broken and defeated.

He remembered listening to the radio receiver, listening to the recruit faction being torn apart as the CCG began to close in on them, taking each member down until there was just a handful of them left. He remembered hearing his own brother, tasked with leading the small faction, and the fear behind his voice as he called out to their superior, who stood looming over Namjoon’s shoulder, standing proud and tall and pretending as if he hadn’t heard their pleas for help.

He stared at the kid in front of him now, eyes staring at the back of his cloak that bore the familiar symbol of Aogiri Tree that he despised so much.

Hoseok had disappeared from beside him, having gone to help the others take out the rest. He could just take this kid out, too, but for some reason, a flashing image of Taehyung stood in the kid’s place.

With one last lingering look at him, Namjoon turned around and headed back to the heat of the battle, quickly taking down one of the assailants going after his brother and piercing straight through his chest, pinning him to the ground.

Five against… about six more. He was liking these odds better now.

 

* * *

 

The five ghouls watched as the last two of what was left of Maro’s squad sprint away with their tails between their legs, one of them quite literally, turning right around the corner just before another onslaught of Yoongi’s crystal shards caught them, painting a carpet of red spikes across the wall and the floor behind them.

“Is it okay to let them go?” Taehyung was asking now, coming up behind Namjoon whose gaze lingered for a little longer before turning to his brother.

“I doubt they’ll think about messing with us again,” he said decisively, his attention then turned to the only one of them he had yet to get the liberty to be introduced to. “And who are you?”

The ghoul in the white bomber jacket straightened his posture as soon as he was addressed, and was quick to untie his mask—a simple black ribbon tied over his eyes, almost like Zorro’s mask—revealing a face that looked about the same age as Taehyung, but round and with somewhat plump cheeks, with a mop of dark hair styled to a messy bowl cut, covered with a snapback turned backwards. Without his  _ kagune _ looming over his form, he appeared to be quite short, but he seemed lithe in his actions from what could be observed from earlier.

“Uh, Park Jimin… sir?” the boy answered somewhat hesitantly, scratching his neck as he took a cautious step forward, coming up behind Taehyung. “I’m, uh, I’m Taehyung’s friend.”

Hoseok moved to give Jimin a harmless slap on the back. “Nice to meet you. Jung Hoseok. Those were some good moves back there, kid.”

Beside them, Yoongi hummed. Namjoon shook his head at his friend, then stretched a hand out to Jimin, which the boy shook with a small bow. “Kim Namjoon, and the grandpa over there is Min Yoongi. Thanks for the help back there.”

“Oh, you’re Tae’s brother!” Jimin exclaimed, almost a bit too loud. “Oh, I’ve always wanted to meet you in person. Tae’s always talking about you.”

“Is that so? All good things, I hope?” A quick glance at Taehyung, whose eyes widened in innocent defence.

Jimin nodded enthusiastically. “Of course. Oh, and the manager, too—”

“Jimin- _ ssi _ .” Before the boy could continue, Taehyung quickly cut in, hand grasping his friend’s shoulder. “Thank god you’re here. We were looking for you, actually.”

Upon hearing this, Jimin blinked a couple of times, his expression fading into confusion. “Me? Wait—what are you guys doing here anyway? I thought you lived all the way over in Ōta.”

“About that…”

“We got into some trouble with Aogiri Tree and we needed to relocate as soon as possible,” Yoongi interjected, perhaps out of sheer impatience, as he crossed his arms in front of him and sighed. “Taehyung told us you worked at a restaurant for ghouls. That you were a refugee, too. Told us your boss could take us in until we figure something out.”

“But what with what just happened, however…” Namjoon trailed off, shaking his head. “Aogiri knows where we are now. I doubt the owner of this restaurant would want to take in known targets of theirs. Maro’s still out and about, too. He’ll report this to the other executives, no doubt.”

Much to their surprise, Jimin seemed indifferent to this, but rather made a scoffing sound and waved it like it was nothing. “Oh, no worries. I’m sure the manager is willing to hear you out. You’re safe with us here, and if those Aogiri goons ever come back, we’ve got you covered. The whole  _ ward  _ has got you covered, even. We have ties with Anteiku, you know, and those guys are  _ not  _ the kind of people you want to mess with.”

_ So, it is true _ . Whatever this Anteiku was, it might have been responsible for keeping the ghouls of this ward in line. Jimin’s boss might be part of this as well.

“Are you sure?” Yoongi was asking, but Jimin was confident with his answer.

“We can go ahead and talk to the manager right now—he lives right above the restaurant in the same building, so he’s always there all the time. I, uh, sorta live there, too. But there’s plenty of space, I’m sure he won’t mind some company. It’s just around this corner.”

“Uh, guys?”

The group immediately turned to Hoseok, who then pointed at a figure crouching against a wall not too far from them. Namjoon recognized it to be the black-cloaked ghoul from earlier, whom Taehyung fought as well—he was still here?

Hoseok put his hand up beside his mouth and whispered, “What do we do with him?”

Silence. Then, one of Yoongi’s wings burst forth once again, but Namjoon was quick to put his hand up to stop the older ghoul from proceeding any further.

“Wait,” he said. “Let me talk to him.”

He sighed in relief when Yoongi, despite being the older one, glared at Namjoon for a brief moment then deflated his shoulders, his single wing retracting back to his skin.

Namjoon took a deep breath before taking cautious steps forward towards the small form hidden from plain view, the  _ rinkaku  _ tentacles now nowhere in sight. He could feel the eyes of his comrades staring at his back as he went up to the ghoul, careful to not make any sudden movements as he reached a hand out to touch the boy’s shoulder. The boy was startled for a bit, flinching at the touch but whipped his head around, dark eyes—normal, human eyes, not his  _ kakugan _ —staring through the holes of his mask.

Lost. Helpless. Afraid.

“Hey, kid,” Namjoon tried, making sure to not let himself seem as threatening. He was speaking with the others in Korean this whole time—the boy probably didn’t have a single idea as to what they were talking about earlier.

“Was it true?” Much to Namjoon’s surprise, the boy replied in fluent Korean.  _ Guess that’s one issue thrown out the window.  _ “What you said, about Maro- _ sama _ . I mean, I heard about it from some of the others—the incident with some of the newer recruits from a while ago. The CCG wiped out an entire squad of them. But Ayato- _ sama  _ told us he was a good man, a good leader. That I should trust him, because I trusted Ayato- _ sama _ .”

“He doesn’t care about his subordinates,” Namjoon replied. “They’re just mere pawns to him, like I was. Like my brother was. Believe us—we’ve both been there.”

The younger ghoul tore away his gaze, eyes staring down at the concrete floor as he clenched his teeth hard, evident as his jaw muscles contracted behind the mask.

“What’s your name?” Namjoon asked before he could stop himself.

The boy looked back up with him with curious intent, eyes blinking as he pondered it over.

“Jeongguk,” he said softly. “Jeon Jeongguk.”

“Nice to meet you, Jeongguk. I’m Namjoon.” Just as he did with Jimin, he stretched a hand out, but Jeongguk took a moment to stare and ponder over it before shaking it. “Do you have someplace else to go? Someone waiting for you?”

Jeongguk shook his head. “No one… No one’s waiting for me back there. I don’t know anyone else other than Ayato- _ sama _ , and I don’t even know if he…” He huffed out a breath. “I’ve got nothing there to come back to. I’ve got no home here.”

“Jimin- _ ssi _ ?” Namjoon looked over his shoulder and called out to his brother’s apparent secret friend, who shrugged.

“Any friend of Taehyung’s is a friend of mine. And by extent, any friend of  _ yours  _ are, too.”

_ That’s one other issue dealt with… _

As the six of them began to depart, Namjoon went up to Hoseok’s side, tapping the latter on his shoulder to gain his attention. Hoseok turned to him with a quirked eyebrow as he pushed his mask down, letting it settle around his neck like a scarf.

“Hmm? What’s up?”

“How did you end up here?” Namjoon asked, not wanting to beat around the bush. “I mean, last time we met, you told us you needed to find your groupmates—your friends.”

“Well, you guys are my friends, too, so I wasn’t too far off.” Hoseok gave a feeble chuckle at first, but his smile soon faltered as his eyes were cast downwards. “And as for the rest of Neuron… I can’t find them. Times like these when I can’t help but think of the worst case scenario. I was fortunate to have had you guys to save my ass back there, but I don’t know about the others…”

Having seen Hoseok’s usual smiling disposition falling apart at the mere mention of his former teammates, Namjoon couldn’t help feeling unsettled in the pit of his stomach. He didn’t know this new acquaintance of his that much, but he didn’t like seeing his comrades upset. And he knew more than a thing or two about losing someone close to him.

“I’m sure they’re fine,” he attempted to reassure Hoseok, patting the latter on the back in attempt to comfort him. “Maybe they’re just… hiding somewhere, from Aogiri. Until coast is clear. Or maybe the doves is giving them some trouble. We can help you find them, if you want.”

“Thanks.” Hoseok offered him a smaller smile this time around. “It’ll be nice to lay low for a bit. I’ll find them again… one of these days. I’ll stick with you guys ‘til then.  

Taehyung and Jimin were not lying about the location of the restaurant; turning around the corner, Namjoon noticed the warm glow of a vertical light box just a little further down the street: ‘Ossu Seiromushi,’ written in both Japanese and Korean, in smaller text right underneath it. Having spotted this as well, Jimin started walking ahead of them, taking lead of the group with Taehyung close to his heels.

It was strange, to say the least—seeing his brother so close to someone that Namjoon himself had never met before. But ever since their encounter with Aogiri, he had been restricting his brother’s movements—for Taehyung’s safety, he reasoned to himself—but seeing his brother starting to chat with jimin, laughing at some joke exchanged between them, it made him reminisce the times when things were simpler, good old days when the brothers were all together. Taehyung should still be in school right now, making new friends and meeting other kids his age, like Jimin. He should be graduating high school even, as Namjoon should be in college right now. Their parents had wanted them to live stable lives, be civil servants or something—assimilate into the rest of human society just like they did.

They might not be able to get their old lives back, but perhaps they could make do with the cards they were dealt with now.

Maybe, they could make their own future.

_ But first… _

Jimin sprinted a little further ahead, stopping right in front of the glass doors, the blinds inside drawn but there was still some yellowish glow of light still peeked through the cracks in between. A metal gate stood in between them and the glass doors, but didn’t seemed to be locked just yet as Jimin pulled them open with ease, then pulled a set of keys from the pocket of his jacket. He unlocked the doors and pushed them open.

“Come on right in, everyone,” he said as he flicked on a light switch on the side of the wall. Overhead lamps begin to turn on one at a time, casting soft, warm glows into the dining area. It wasn’t the large, five-star restaurant type; it was simple, with a decent number of wooden chairs and tables, odd ornaments displayed on shelves and canvas paintings hung on the wooden panel walls. It was spacious enough that even with the six of them there, it didn’t feel cramped the slightest bit, even more so when Taehyung, Hoseok and even Jeongguk began wandering around, marvelling at the new sights to see.

Jimin, on the other hand, was in his own state of blind rush; he shut the metal gate and glass doors closed, making sure to have locked them both, before he switched on what one could assume was the thermostat, sighing when he saw the rest of the group had scattered across the entire space.

“Jimin- _ ssi _ ? Is that you? Took you a while just to take out the goddamn trash. And what’s the commotion out there?”

Namjoon stilled in his movements, his muscles not making even the slightest twitches. He  _ recognized  _ this voice—it came from the back, where he assumed the kitchen would be, accompanied with some clanking metal before it settled down, returning the atmosphere to its previous silent state.

He paled. It couldn’t be… could it?

“Ah,  _ hyung _ ,” Jimin was calling back now, his voice ringing a little louder than how he’d been talking this whole time. “I hope you don’t mind, but I’ve brought some friends over. They’re, uh, they’re quite in the pickle—thought you could help them out for a bit, you know?”

“What are you talking about, Jimin?” The voice was coming closer now, clearer and not so muddled. Namjoon heard the sound of doors opening. “You know, one of these days, you have to stop bringing your ‘friends’ back here. You’re going to end up with more trouble than you’re asking for—”

Silence, and Namjoon’s limbs went frigid.  _ That voice _ …

He slowly turned around, eyes making a straight scan across the room until they locked gazes with a pair of brown eyes—eyes that were far too familiar to his, belonging to a face he had missed far,  _ far  _ too much.

The two of them stood there on a stalemate, mouths wide open, neither of them daring to utter a single word.

“Namjoon- _ ah _ .”

He could feel the ache in his chest as the voice that had been ingrained in the back of his head for the past two years, a voice he longed to wake up to in early mornings whenever he was going to run late for school, a voice he grew up with his entire life.

“ _ Hyung _ .” His words, the ones he’d been practicing as part of this stupid, elaborate speech he’d been preparing the past two years since the guilt began settling inside of him, were now caught in his throat. It was as though his own voice had been robbed from him, betraying him the single moment he needed it the most. “I—”

He didn’t get a chance to speak. Before he knew it, a pair of arms were thrown around him, pulling him against something warm and soft and reeked of detergent and coffee and spices, a scent he took a deep whiff of, instantly sending him back down the path of nostalgia. His head nestled against a set of wide shoulders, and before he could stop himself, his arms wrapped around the figure as well, letting his shoulders drop as he melted into the warm, inviting hug he’d longed for so long.

“I’ve missed you,” his older brother’s voice, sounding a lot more mature and wiser than he remembered, struggling to form coherent words in between brewing sobs. “God, I’ve missed you.”

Namjoon closed his eyes. “I’ve missed you, too,  _ hyung _ .”

Another pair of arms wrapped themselves around the two, forcing them to part a little, allowing space for their youngest brother to squeeze in, before melting back into a giant hug between brothers.

“I’ve missed you both,” said Kim Seokjin, through his tears. “So much.”


	5. The Rise of Bangtan

“So. How’ve you been?”

Namjoon sat on one side of a wooden table, in a quaint little restaurant situated in the middle of Tokyo’s 20th ward; if someone were to ask him last week what he’d be doing, right here and now, this would be the literal last thing he’d have on his mind.

And he was still trying to take it all in—let the hard truth sink into the pit of his stomach and etch itself into the forefront of his mind: the fact that his own brother, Kim Seokjin, was alive and well, and Namjoon was here, a guest in his brother’s restaurant. 

Seokjin had matured well since Namjoon last saw him. He’s twenty years old now, a man in his own right, and from the looks of it, a well-off business owner in his own right as well. His brother sat across from him wearing a crisp white collared shirt, all buttoned up to the collar, dark trousers and dress shoes. Earlier, Namjoon noticed him putting on an old white apron before disappearing into the kitchen in the back—he recognized it to be their mother’s, as some of the stains had been there since before Taehyung was even born, but there were others he’d never seen before.

He remembered the apron being one of the few possessions they’d taken with them when they first fled their home back in Seoul. It was comforting to see that Seokjin had been putting their mother’s apron into good use this whole time.

Not long after their tearful but short reunion—it was awkward when there were four other people just witnessing them embracing each other in silence—Seokjin dragged Jimin along with him and reappeared a while later with a couple of trays full of food each. Seokjin had taken off his apron then, before he reappeared in the dining room; Seokjin had inherited not just the apron but also their mother’s love for cooking as well, so it was no surprise to either of his brothers to see bowls of rice and human flesh, cooked into the taste of classic Korean cuisine that should be familiar to all of them. Jimin, his sole employee, showed no obvious reaction to all the food, either. 

The same thing could not be said for the others, however.

Namjoon smiled upon noticing the bewildered looks upon his comrades’ faces when the food first came out, refusing to believe that the normal-looking meals actually smelled appetizing, mouthwatering even. Then there was the confusion that came with the inspecting sniffs, followed with excitement that came with the hunger that soon overtook all three of them. Jungkook—the kid, also the newest addition to their group of misfits—almost began dinner ahead of the others as soon as Jimin placed one of the dishes right in front of them, until Yoongi gave him a condescending look that caused him to shrink back to his seat, obediently waiting until Jimin stashed the tray away and joined them at the table.

Once all the food came out and Seokjin joined the rest of them with a couple bottles of blood soju in his hands, all the others but Namjoon, Seokjin and Yoongi dug in without question, eager to enjoy the hot, home-cooked meals while they lasted. It wasn’t until Namjoon gave Yoongi a judgemental look that the older ghoul relented, reaching over to grab a bowl of rice and beginning to scoop spoonfuls of the  _ kimchi-jjigae  _ to add to his bowl.

Namjoon had turned back to look at his brother to see Seokjin giving  _ him  _ the same look, also urging him to eat along with the rest of the starving group, even though Namjoon was looking forward to their long-awaited conversation more than getting his fill to last the rest of the month. In the end, the younger sibling gave in out of force of habit, but remained a bit ginger in his actions as he waited for the younger ones to take whatever and however much they wanted before beginning to take spoonfuls of the side dishes of his own.

“Oh, you know,” Namjoon sighed. Sure, he was expecting this conversation for a while, but now that he was actually face-to-face with his brother, he had absolutely no idea how to proceed from here. What was he supposed to do? Kneel in front of Seokjin and beg him for shelter and food, at least for the sake of Taehyung? Maybe it was a ghoul thing—preserving his dignity and sense of self worth and all that. “Just… surviving.”

Seokjin had started to pour them each a glass of blood soju, but only three of them were old enough to drink and thus accepted the alcohol—Namjoon, Hoseok and Yoongi, plus another glass for himself. He then stood up and headed back to behind the main counter, mumbling something about getting coffee for the others, which Taehyung soon responded with a request for a tall glass of water instead.

“I do know, actually.” The sound of slamming drawers accompanied Seokjin’s distant voice, then a quiet curse under his breath as he wondered about where the coffee was. “Well, from what Taehyung told me the last time he was here, anyway.”

“Tae?” Namjoon quirked an eyebrow as he turned to their youngest brother, whose eyes widened for a split second before he went back to stuffing mouthfuls of rice and kimchi in his mouth, feigning innocence. “Wait, is that how he knew about this place? Have you two been meeting up behind my back?”

“No, not really,” Seokjin laughed as he rummaged the cupboards. “Jimin brought him here once. They met at a  _ manga  _ shop or something—I don’t remember. Jimin came back and asked if I needed an extra set of hands to help out around the kitchen, or out here waiting tables, since it’s just the two of us running this place here. Language barrier wasn’t even a problem, either. I told him I’d consider it, but I didn’t know that Jimin had been talking about Taehyung this whole time until he brought him back here himself and re-introduced me to my own little brother.”

“But, still. He knew all along.”

“ _ Yah _ , spare the poor kid. He means well.” From behind the counter now came clinks of a spoon hitting against ceramic. “He even asked if the three of us should get together sometime. We haven’t before tonight because I’m not even sure if  _ you  _ would want to see me again after all this time.

Namjoon didn’t respond, swallowing the saliva pooling in his mouth. His brother had it all wrong—Namjoon was the one who should be hanging his head in shame after he’d let something trivial ruin their relationship just like that, once upon a time ago. He was the one who was afraid that, after how he left things off with Seokjin, it wouldn’t all be hugs and ‘missed you’s the second the two meet eyes for the first time in two years.

Because the truth was, his brother wasn’t wrong in the first place—he wasn’t wrong back then, when he’d told Namjoon that there was something off about Aogiri and its supposed ‘mission’ for upholding ghoul rights and all that bullcrap they’d served to new recruits back then. He’d been right to suspect them. He’d been right to believe those ghouls were up to no good—it was a shame that Namjoon had to figure that out the hard way. 

He wasn’t ashamed of admitting it was a mistake to trust Aogiri. He was just ashamed that he’d put their own little brother’s life at risk because of  _ his  _ mistake.

He didn’t notice Seokjin had returned with two steaming mugs of coffee for Jungkook and Jimin, as well as Taehyung’s glass of water, until he returned to his seat right across from Namjoon, his face kind and concerned much to Namjoon’s disbelief, until he took a shot of the soju and scrunched his face.

“You know,” he said, setting his glass back down and despite his reaction to the alcohol, he poured himself another shot. “You still haven’t told me how you ended up here anyway, with both Taehyung and Jimin, and a bunch of other boys I’ve never seen before. Your squad from Aogiri or something?”

At the mention of Aogiri, almost all of them tensed up as the noise of utensils clicking against bowls and plates dissipated in an instant: Yoongi looked like he was going to kill someone, Hoseok’s smile disappeared, Taehyung shifted in his seat and Jungkook shrunk into his. Seokjin’s eyes widened at the silence, with a concerned glance around the table, while Namjoon sucked in air through his teeth and pondered over how in the hell he would explain this to his brother.

“We, uh…” Namjoon took a shot of his soju and let it burn down his throat as he swallowed. “You could say that all of us have had at least one bad run-in with Aogiri at some point. Not excluding tonight, just about half an hour ago.”

Realization dawned on Seokjin’s face. “So that’s what all the ruckus in the back of the building was all about.”

“Taehyung and Namjoon-hyung were outnumbered.” Jimin was shoving rice and grilled meat into his mouth as he spoke through the food. “I didn’t know who the others were, but I knew those two, so I figured I should help out.”

Namjoon nodded, then began gesturing to each of the others Seokjin had yet to be acquainted with. “That’s Yoongi-hyung, Hoseok and Jungkook.” The first two gave them a curt nod upon the mention of their names, but Jungkook was too timid to express acknowledgement beyond a nervous glance and a purse of the lips. “I met Yoongi-hyung while I was out hunting one night. We got into a fight, we both almost killed each other, and then the doves were coming in so we had to get the hell out of there. I injured him bad enough that I felt bad about it so I took him back to where Tae and I were staying.”

Yoongi scowled then, but Taehyung was quick to add, “Then he stayed with us even after that because he cared about us.” This earned him a sharp jab of an elbow to the younger ghoul’s side, though it didn’t seem that Yoongi put much strength into it as Taehyung barely gave a reaction to it.

Seokjin, on the other hand, gave Yoongi a nod of gratitude. “Then I suppose I should be thanking you for taking care of these two fools when I couldn’t.”

Yoongi scoffed, “Honest to god, I don’t know how you deal with those two for so long.”

“I don’t either.”

“Hoseok’s group was also on the run from Aogiri.” Namjoon pretended to ignore his brother’s rather-harsh remark; he didn’t, however, miss the way Hoseok’s expression faltered the slightest bit at the mere mention of his former group. “We found him cornered so we helped him up. I don’t know of his whereabouts ever since until he showed up to repay the favour just earlier tonight.”

Hoseok swallowed the food in his mouth before offering a small smile. “That’s what friends are for, right?”

“Jungkook was with the group who ambushed us in the back alley just now. The rest of the group bailed and left the kid to us.”

Seokjin hummed, nodding and staring at his glass as he tilted it from side to side. “I guess he reminds him of what you two had to go through once upon a time, huh?”

Namjoon felt himself tense at his brother’s words. He straightened his posture, lifted his shoulders as he tried to suppress some of the anger that was beginning to leak out through the walls of calm composure he kept up for himself. “Hyung—”

“No, I don’t want to talk about it here, either.” Seokjin had begun pouring the two of them some more soju. “It’s something we need to talk about, but it’s a conversation for later. You still haven’t told me how you five ended up here anyway.”

“That attack in the back alley? It was an ambush. Aogiri Tree does not take well to those who abandoned their cause.”

“As with most cults do, yeah.” Seokjin sighed. “The 20th ward should’ve been off-limits, though. We do have the least number of ghouls here, but the ones that do live here are not ones to be messed with. You’ve heard of Anteiku before?”

Namjoon nodded. “I’ve heard rumors of it.”

“Yeah, best coffee in town, with decent people with decent personalities for the most part. But they’re also the ones governing this ward, keeping the peace here. Aogiri should know better than to trespass this area and cause trouble.”

“Doesn’t mean we can linger around for long.” Namjoon picked up some rice and meat and stuffed it in his mouth, not meeting his brother’s gaze. “Some of them escaped. That’s what happened last time—that’s what made us vulnerable to an ambush. They’ll be looking for us now. There’s no doubt they’ll be coming back to finish the job.”

“Then stay.”

A brief moment of sheer silence; he didn’t think that the others were listening to their conversation beyond the initial introduction, but it seemed that at least one or two of them were. Yoongi perhaps, or Hoseok—the two older ones. Maybe Jungkook, who didn’t seem much for talk at the moment, perhaps taking everything in, being more observant than the others would assume him to be.

“Stay here,” Seokjin said, reiterating his words with more confidence this time. “With me—with us.” 

“I can’t do that to you, hyung.” Namjoon shook his head. “This is your life’s work, your dream come true—what you’ve wanted to do with Mom for the longest time. This is your home here. I can’t do that to you.”

“And you’re my brother.” Both of Seokjin’s hands took hold of Namjoon’s unattended one, grasping it and enveloping it with the sense of warmth and familiarity he’d missed for the longest time. A glimpse of a forgotten memory flashed past his eyes and disappeared as soon as it appeared. “C’mon, we’ve lived in many places before—Gwacheon, Ilsan, Geochang, Daegu, then Seoul. A bed’s always replaceable. My brothers aren’t—my  _ family  _ isn’t. And I don’t intend to lose any more again.”

Seokjin must’ve not realized he was raising his voice the more he spoke, a bit too loud for either of their liking because it didn’t take them both long to realize that the silence in the room was much more extended this time. Namjoon turned to the rest of the table, feeling the others’ gaze upon the two of them, but all he could see was Seokjin in his peripherals, still latching onto his hand; and Taehyung, whose wide eyes darted back and forth between his two older siblings, his chopsticks held idle in the air as his grip loosened enough that the lump of rice held between it fell back to the bowl it came from.

Namjoon sighed. “We can’t risk staying here, hyung. And besides, I doubt the other ghouls here would take kindly to us being the cause of trouble here, even if we’re not the ones causing it. They’ll kick us out anyway.”

“I’ll talk to them. I know them—you don’t have to worry about pissing them off, because I know for a fact that they’ll be more pissed off at Aogiri than at us. They’ll be glad to have you here, even.”

“And you’re just going to accept this? What about them—Hoseok, Yoongi—”

“Kookie?” The two of them looked towards Taehyung, who encircled his arm around Jungkook’s shoulders. Jungkook himself made a small sound before he fell silent once again, turning his gaze away from everyone in the room once again in favor of returning his focus to his meal. Of course, Taehyung would be the one to strike the first conversation.

“If they mean that much to you,” Seokjin said with a small smile, “then you’re all welcome.”

“You can’t possibly mean that.” Seokjin turned back to Namjoon, who stared back at his brother almost incredulously. “There’s seven of us. This place doesn’t look like it’s enough for seven boys to be running around and living together for god-knows-how-long.”

“Well, if you’re assuming we’ll be running, then yes, this place is  _ way  _ too small for that and I’ll kick all of you out of here the second you break anything.” The eldest took a deep breath before continuing, “But I am in desperate need for a couple more employees to help out down here, in the restaurant, in the kitchen. Business has been better than expected and Anteiku’s starting to outsource some of the, uh…  _ food management  _ for ghouls in the ward to us. I didn’t expect to have  _ five  _ pairs of helping hands, but help is help and the more I can get, the better.”

“So, you’re basically asking us to work for you?” Both brothers turned to the far corner of the table where Yoongi sat, the latter quirking an eyebrow at the assumed proposition he mentioned. “In exchange for what? Protection?”

Seokjin nodded his head to the side. “Extended from the one given to me by the folks back at Anteiku, yes. But also food, of course—I mean, this  _ is  _ a restaurant, after all. And the second floor can be your temporary living arrangements, until we can figure something out or rent out a bigger space. Well,  _ our  _ living arrangements, I guess.”

He glanced around the table, seeing how most of the dishes had been swept clean save for remnants of sauces, which the younger ones might’ve licked off the plates themselves if none of them exercised humane constraint. Jimin had begun to gather them even without his apparent employer telling him to do so, taking them behind the counter again to wash them until Seokjin called him. 

“Jimin, take them upstairs,” he said, taking the tray of dishes from Jimin’s hands. “Show them where all the stuff is. I’ll clean up down here and join you guys later.”

Upstairs was an entirely different environment than the restaurant. It was a bit of a mess, considering this had been Seokjin’s new home since the brothers went their separate ways, but it was an organized mess, indicating that maybe Seokjin had yet to find the time to clean the place up. Or maybe having an extra mouth to feed, or at least a younger roommate loitering around, might have been robbing Seokjin of the time he needed to make this place one he could truly call home.

The living room might’ve looked bigger if there wasn’t so much clutter all over the place, though it didn’t seem that the rest of the residence didn’t have enough space for everything; there was a small CRT TV in the corner beside a couple of lean bookshelves that weren’t the slightest bit identical to each other, leaning against the wall with a door to another room, as well as a set of drying racks leaning against the windows. There was no couch but there was a small coffee table in the middle of the room.

Namjoon couldn’t help noticing there were a number of figurines on the bookshelf, aside from the Korean-to-Japanese dictionaries and volumes of manga, and a portion of them happened to be figurines of Mario, from  _ Super Mario Bros. _ , Seokjin’s favorite game.

The kitchen was about just as big as the living room and just as cluttered. White counters with a couple of standard kitchen appliances, white cabinets, a two-door fridge that looked like it was secondhand, days away from breaking down for good, even. 

The bedroom, however, looked as if it was supposed to be for just one person, which should be expected. Upon checking it for the first time, Namjoon was a bit worried how all  _ seven  _ of them were going to fit, seeing as this was the topmost floor of the building, and there wasn’t any other space other than the restaurant downstairs. What’s worse was the fact that there wasn’t even a proper air-mattress, much less a bed in the room—just two traditional Japanese futons on the bare wooden floor, pushed against the corner of the room beneath the window. Aside from that, the room bore a wooden dresser, and one thing that immediately caught Namjoon’s eye as he glanced around the room: a framed photograph of their family, back when it was still whole and happier days still existed.

“It’s not much, but I suppose it’s something.”

Namjoon turned around to see his brother approaching from the direction of the stairs, arms crossed across his chest.

“It’s more than enough,” Namjoon reassured, sending his brother a gaze filled with gratitude. “Thank you, hyung.”

Seokjin then headed over to the window and picked up the framed picture.

“Think they’ll be glad to see us together again?”

“I don’t want to think we’ve disappointed them,” said Namjoon instead, his eyes darting elsewhere and his ears tuning out the voices of the others arguing amongst themselves. 

“They’re in a better place, wherever that might be.” Seokjin tilted his head to the side. “I mean, compared to this hellhole.”

There was no arguing against that. Seokjin set the photo back down against the window before turning around and exiting the room, patting Namjoon’s shoulder as he passed.

“I might be able to afford us some bunk beds,” the older ghoul added, speaking his words like it was a mere side remark—a passing thought, “just so you guys don’t have to sleep on the floor with just a pillow and a blanket and maybe a tatami to keep yourselves comfortable.

Namjoon turned on his heel and sighed. “Hyung, you don’t have to—”

“I want to. I’m not a savage, you know, and I don’t expect the rest of you to live like savages either. I just haven’t found the time to get out and get a proper bed for myself. I should, though, because my back is killing me like you can’t even imagine. I don’t know how the people here do it—it’s like sleeping on the floor, but worse because of the illusion that you’re not sleeping on the floor even when it feels like it.”

“Well, thanks, but I’m exhausted  _ now _ .”

WIthout warning, Yoongi’s smaller stature slipped from in between others’ bodies and in between Seokjin and Namjoon, pausing the moment he entered the bedroom. He narrowed his eyes at the two makeshift beds in the corner of the room.

“I’ll take that spare pillow and blanket now, please,” Yoongi sighed as he turned back around, setting his duffel bag on the floor next to the doorframe, yawning and stretching his neck to the side as he stalked back towards the living area. “How the rest of you are still active and out and about like children never ceases to amaze me.”

He was referring to the younger ones, of course, as Taehyung and Jungkook noticed the bookshelves, marvelling and fanboying over the manga and figurines, and Jimin was right behind them, introducing them to his own collection of manga. Even Hoseok didn’t seem to be worn out, just a bit tired judging from his movements but still had a smile plastered across his face, reminding the first two not to touch anything fragile lest they break it.

“It’s fine, Hoseok. As long as they stay away from the Mario ones—those are mine. Break one, and I’ll have you sleep downstairs for a whole week.” Seokjin assured him with a simple wave of his hand, then headed towards the dresser to pull up several sheets of duvets. Stocks for winter, perhaps. “I don’t have a lot of pillows, so I guess you guys do have to share, and sleep like savages for the meantime.”

“Dibs on a pillow,” Yoongi called out from outside.

“I can close the restaurant tomorrow and we can all go shopping or something. Then afterwards I can teach you guys how to not break things at the restaurant.”

Namjoon took the initiative to bend down and help pick up the blankets, sorting them out and laying all five of them on the floor. “Hyung, you’re being too generous, you know. You’ve just met some of these guys. I mean, I vouched for their innocence and everything, but I wasn’t hoping you’d go this far for us.”

Seokjin gave a small laugh. “I’d like to think I’m paying it forward, Joon-ah. Or maybe I just like being nice to people, instead of being full of anger like you always were.”

Namjoon scoffed, but took no offense from his brother because, again, Seokjin was right. “Paying it forward? From whom? Anteiku?”

“Eh, sort of,” Seokjin replied, nodding his head side to side. “People back there helped me get back on my feet, set up this place and everything. Came to the soft opening, even. And none of them even knew who I was back then—a starving beggar from another country who barely speaks their language. At least these guys are friends of my brothers, and the language barrier isn’t a problem at all.”

“I don’t know how I’ll be able to thank you.” Namjoon sat down on one of the spread duvets, leaning back with his palms flat on the soft cushions. “Not just for this, but for everything. Not sure how you’ll ever forgive me for that matter, either.”

There was a brief moment of silence that followed—brief because the others outside prevented this place from being peaceful for long, something that Seokjin seemed to notice as well, as he sighed exasperatedly at the noise.

“I don’t blame you as much as I blame Aogiri Tree,” said Seokjin. “I mean, I’ve heard bad things about them before you even left, but I’ve heard worse from the people at Anteiku. I just wished I could’ve found you guys sooner, but you know… The talk.”

“I should’ve listened.”

“And as I said before, it’s a conversation for later.” When Yoongi stalked back in, muttering something about getting dibs on a pillow, Seokjin nodded towards him. “You guys are tired and I am, too, but I know too well that putting up a fight against others of our own is more exhausting than keeping up with a lunch rush. Having a full stomach should help with that, though.”

Seven people sleeping on the floor of the bedroom was a little cramped, but it was manageable. Namjoon, Yoongi and Taehyung had pajamas—or at least some semblance of it even though it was just a t-shirt and shorts—while Seokjin lent some extra clothes for the other two newcomers. Some of them fell asleep as soon as their heads landed on the soft cushions of cotton underneath fabric, with Yoongi being the first and the younger ones’ excitement from earlier seemed to be a facade for how exhausted they truly were, falling asleep like babies one after the another.

It was Hoseok’s turn to use the bathroom, and the rest of them laid in silence in the darkness of the room, with Namjoon taking this time to reflect on what happened just today alone—it felt like ages ago when they left Ōta, like it wasn’t just this morning.

But things were alright now—better than anticipated, even. He had allies—friends—and his family was whole again. As whole as it could be, at least.

“Hey, guys? Is anyone still awake?”

Even though it was whispered, Namjoon could tell in a heartbeat that it was Taehyung’s voice speaking in the darkness. Well, that and the fact that it came from right beside him, and Namjoon knew Taehyung chose to be close to both his brothers himself.

And he was just about to respond to his brother, when Seokjin beat him to it.

“Go to sleep, Tae.”

“I can’t.”

“Close your eyes,” Namjoon whispered back. “Aren’t you tired?”

“I am, but…” Taehyung sighed. “I can’t help thinking about Aogiri.”

“Just close your eyes, Tae. Just like how I taught you—”

“No. That’s not what I meant.” A beat of pause. “Back there, in the alley. Six of us, now seven with Seokjin-hyung. We could be a group, you know? Well, not like Aogiri, but like Hoseok-hyung’s old group, or Yoongi-hyung’s—”

“Go to sleep, Taehyung.” It was Yoongi who responded back this time, his voice ridden with sleep as he slurred his words through his half-conscious state. It almost made Namjoon snicker. “It’s well past midnight. Everyone else wants to.”

“We’ll talk about this in the morning.” Namjoon found his brother’s hand through the darkness, clutching it tight with his own and giving it a short squeeze. “Alright? Just go to sleep—we’re all right here.”

“Yeah.” Another sigh as Namjoon let go of the hand. “Okay.”

For the first time in a long while, Namjoon fell asleep that night with a smile on his face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's not my best work, I know. But I'm trying. Honestly I don't know how people can write like 5k words per chapter or per part and it's legit good, and here I am grasping at straws.
> 
> I really want to get back to writing regularly, like I used to once upon a time ago. And make actual good legit writing while I'm at it, too. Nowadays I spend too much time reading fanfiction than actually writing good stuff.
> 
> I tried climbing a mountain, I slipped and fell and grabbed onto a ledge just in time before plummeting to my figurative death but broke an arm in the process, I guess. Now it's just a longer climb back up, but I'll get there. Someday.

**Author's Note:**

> Irregular updates (a.k.a. whenever I do finish a chapter). Kudos and comments are always appreciated!


End file.
